


It will last

by DeaPotteriana



Series: Just another universe [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Avengers Family, But things already happened, Domestic Avengers, For Science!, Hydra (Marvel), Kids, Like litterally, M/M, Multi, Protective Avengers, Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark, Tony Being Tony, Tony Stark Does What He Wants, Ultron is important, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-27
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-04-13 18:25:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 29,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14118261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeaPotteriana/pseuds/DeaPotteriana
Summary: When Tony Stark, Bruce Banner and Jane Foster decide to do Science! and to create a portal to an alternative universe, they pick the most damaged one; from it, they pick the people who need it the most.That's when a boy and a girl appear in the middle of the lab - but they're not just normal kids.And the Avengers are about to realize it.English is not my first language, but come in anyway and give the story a shot ;)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Attention, please!  
> In this world, Ultron happened, then Steve asked the help of the Avengers to find Bucky and now they're all living happily in the Avengers Tower - Jane Foster and Darcy Lewis too.  
> HYDRA is gone. They're happy! :D
> 
>  
> 
> English is not my first language, but I hope I managed :P  
> Kudos and comments are appreciated!
> 
> Oh, also, it's my first story in English and on this website, so... Be kind :)

**CHAPTER 1**

 

 

“Tony!”

The yell got lost in the ear-wrecking sound in which the all Tower was immersed. It had been that noise to alert the Avengers, who had ran into Tony’s lab with the weapons in the hands, ready to fight. Between various types of machinery there were Jane, Bruce and Tony himself, and it looked like they were shouting at each other; however, the noise was so loud that neither Steve nor Bucky, both with the enchanted hearing, could listen to them.

“Tony!” Steve tried again and at that moment all the metallic noises that had been so hard to stand stopped, substituted by the ones of waves. Tony turned and smiled, a full _I’m-a-crazy-genius-superhero_ smile that made Steve shiver, and the sound increased.

But it was something else that got the Avengers’ attention.

At the very center of the lab there was a big water-like circle mid-air, with little lightings all around.

“May the Allfather protect us all,” Thor muttered taking a step forward. Jane, his beloved, was in danger and he would _not_ have stayed back. 

The electric field around the strange thing, however, wouldn’t let anyone pass; it was so strong that when Clint - being Clint - shot an arrow to it, it made him fly against the wall.

“Блядь,” Natasha murmured and Bucky, next to her, nodded. Steve didn’t know Russian, but he was pretty sure he agreed too.

The waves sound increased even more and an image started forming on the thing - Steve had no idea how to call that freaking circle. “Is that...” he started saying, just when Natasha spoke. 

“We have to take Bruce away. We do _not_ need him to let The Hulk out!” she shouted, trying to overhang the noise.

And then, in a second, everything stopped. The air wasn’t electrostatic anymore, the machines weren’t moving and the electric field that didn’t let anyone approach fell.

And in the middle of the lab, looking as shocked as the Avengers were, there was a young man. He was almost as big as Steve was, but with a definitely younger face. His hair was black and the eyes were brown - he sort of reminded Steve of Tony, or of how Tony would have looked with an innocent expression and a super-soldier body.

The kid - he was young, for God’s sake! - looked at Steve and paled; he then noticed the rest of the Avengers; he took a step back and smiled, a sad, heart-breaking smile that disappeared when he lowered the head. “Am I dead?” he asked in a breath.

“No,” Tony laughed. “No, better! We,” and he moved his hand to indicate Bruce and Jane, “we made you travel from another _universe_!”

“We have so many questions!” Jane added with a smile. Just at that moment Steve noticed that, hidden under a desk, there was her lab assistant, Darcy Lewis. He felt compassion for her for a second, before he got the attention back to the stranger.

“We have also some tests to take. But first...” Bruce smirked trying to sound as relaxed as possible. However, he didn’t get to finish to talk because the kid threw himself against the circle - Steve really had to find out the name of that thing.

“Don’t let him touch it!” Tony shouted and in a second Thor had his big arms on the boy’s chest, wrapping him against his torso.

“No! No! Let me go!” he yelled and fought. “Rey! _Rey!_ I’d rather be dead than live without her!”

He had just the time to say that, when a new wave of energy and electricity made everyone in the lab shiver and take a step back. It only lasted a minute or so, before at the center of the lab a girl appeared. She looked younger than the boy and almost the opposite, physically talking. Little, with a long braid of blonde hair - with a part of the left side of the head shaved - and blue eyes. 

She stared at the Avengers and she opened her mouth as to speak, when she saw Tony and stopped. She took a step back too and Steve wondered for a second what kind of universe they’ve had to be in, for looking at them in that way.

“Could you let me go now?” the boy requested with a deep breath; Thor immediately left him and the stranger did not lose time. He ran to the girl and hugged her as his life depended on that.

“What a beautiful young love,” Thor beamed - which means almost shout, because he was Thor - and Clint snorted, biting back a joke or two.

“I thought I’d never see you again,” the boy murmured and he kissed the girl’s forehead. He then turned to face the Avengers. “And she’s not my girlfriend.”

“Oh, that’s sad,” Tony grinned, “but you’re both covered in dust and you’re in my lab so... In the showers. Now.”

“Don’t talk as you’re not the one who brought them here in the first place,” Steve sneered ignoring Natasha’s thoughtful look and Bucky’s focused expression. He would have dealt with them later.

“You’re breaking my heart, love,” Tony smiled and Steve had the urge to punch him - or kiss him, it depended.

“You two... Together?” the boy inquired while the girl stared at the floor. 

“Yeah, ah ah. And the hell is freezing,” Clint snorted. Tony and almost everyone in the room smiled or laughed a little at that, but Steve - and he was sure Natasha and Bucky noticed too - saw the strangers exchanging a look and biting back a smile.

What on earth did we do in their universe?, Steve thought once more.

He did not have an answer.

 

 

“What the hell did you three had in mind?!”

Steve tried not to sound too pissed, but he really couldn’t understand how someone as smart as they were could have done something so stupid.

“Steve,” Jane Foster said with a calm tone that made him even angrier, “we’re scientists! And this is science. We saw a chance and we took it, nothing more.”

“We looked for a world with the same conditions as ours, so that the risk of new viruses or infections was low,” Bruce tried not to smile, still euphoric for the success of the experiment. “And Tony created an algorithm that allowed us to pick the most destroyed and dangerous world.”

“Yeah,” Tony agreed while taking a cup and the coffee, “calm down, _Stars and Stripes_. We also picked the people who needed it most. As we’re all aware of, I’m a genius. You don’t call someone a genius if they don’t do genius things.”

Steve moved to the couch and sat down with a worried expression. They knew nothing about those kids, not even if they had a family back in their world. If they needed medications or if they were human at all. Maybe they had powers. Maybe they were dangerous.

“It was a risk you shouldn’t have taken,” Natasha snapped, looking out of the window as to find an answer. 

“Yeah, above all after the Ultron thing,” Clint murmured. Bucky, that at the time wasn’t with them, shot him a look.

“But it’s done,” Natasha continued. “Friday, are they still in the showers?”

“They are dressing up with the clothes doctor Banner and doctor Foster gave them, Agent Romanoff.”

“I’ll talk with them, try to find out as much as I can.”

“Don’t scare them, Nat,” Tony smiled, then he took a sip of coffee. “They’re just kids, after all.”

“I started killing long before I had their age.”

And with that, she disappeared in the hall. 

“So…” Tony spoke after a second, “does anyone want to see how it goes?”

They were the Avengers, but oh, how they were curious.

“Friday, the video, please… Let’s just hope Nat doesn’t kill them. I already like those two.”

 

 

“Come in!”

Natasha lowered the hand which she had knocked with and she entered the bathroom the Avengers used after the training sessions. She immediately observed as much as she could: the boy had a big scar on his back, that started under the neck and ended on his right ribs. The girl had a scar almost identical from the center of her back to the lower-right part, just as if she had been partially protected by him from something.

They were both in tension, glazing at the Avenger with unsurprised looks.

“You’re here to interrogate us,” the boy stated, not even bothering to make it a question. The girl said nothing.

“No,” Natasha replied, moving a little her hands to show them she was calm and friendly. “Just to talk. Get to know each other.”

“Then we could do it with the others, in the living room. You prefer working alone on the resources, but this is just a chat, isn’t it?”

Natasha forced herself not to look impressed, but she was. “Of course, as you wish,” she nodded, smiling. “You’re injured… Do you need help?” she asked noticing they both had bandages all over their bodies. 

The girl - Rey? - refused moving her head.

“Yours must have been a pretty rough world, am I right?” Natasha said while she made herself look pensive.

“It was. Shall we go?” the boy replied.

“Agent Romanoff, Captain Rogers asks to see the foreigners,” Friday interrupted them. 

Natasha nodded and led them to the living room. They seemed well aware of how she used to work and on one hand she appreciated it, - it was cool not to have to explain herself and her behavior - but on the other, she didn’t know them. She was vulnerable.

And she hated it.

The kids followed her, holding hands behind her back as to give each other strength. They were really different and yet so similar, with the same lost expression.

“I get that you know all of us,” Natasha murmured.

“You can say that,” the boy nodded. The girl, a lot smaller than him, looked at them without a word.

Natasha already had some theories about it. She was either born mute, or she became it - it didn’t matter if physically or psychologically. The fact that she hadn't signed, not even once, made Natasha almost sure she wasn’t born that way.

“Well, well, well.” 

Tony stood up and smiled, and the girl looked about to break apart. The boy, however, seemed to hold it better than her; he took her hand and all the Avengers, with Darcy and Jane too, moved to leave two spots on the couches.

The kids sat down, out of place just as Steve was sure he looked talking about technology.

“Hi,” he decided to start talking. “You both know who we are. Am I right?”

The girl nodded. She was touching the couch in awe, almost surprised that she was really able to do so, and she was cute as hell.

For a second, in a flash, Steve thought about how could have been to have a kid like her. A beautiful, little child with his hair and his eyes (she kind of looked like him) and - no, not her attitude. She was too scared. Too in pain. Too damaged.

She made him think about all those soldiers he had lost in battle and, above all, those who had survived. They’d never been the same.

Steve forced himself to keep talking - and to stop distracting himself.

“Okay. Perfect. Then… Let’s talk about you, would you?”

Bucky shot him a look that meant “kick yourself or I’m gonna do it” and Steve realized that the girl - he was sure her name was Rey or something alike - never spoke in front of them. Her friend, however, seemed easier to talk to… And to obtain an answer from.

“My name is Alexander, but you can call me Alex. She’s my sister, Reyna. Rey is okay though,” the boy smiled.

“Sister!” Thor and Darcy blurted at the same time.

“Not a beautiful young love, then,” Thor continued.

“Siblings love each other,” Clint shrugged. “Or, well, they usually do.”

“I do love my brother,” Thor exclaimed.

“Yeah, we know,” Jane muttered. “Too well, if you ask me.”

“Guys,” Bruce interrupted them. “Let’s give Alex a chance to talk, eh?”

Alex was smiling, tears in his eyes, and Rey was biting her right cheek.

The boy was cute too, Steve thought. It was like he was trying with everything he had to be positive and strong, but was just really, really tired.

“Actually… We would like to know a few things,” Alex requested. “Like… How is this world?”

“What do you mean?” Steve asked while Clint shouted “ _A mess!_ ”.

“I mean that this world looks far better than ours. It’s, you know… In peace.”

He was looking out of the big window, where New York shined in its armor.

“Yours is in war,” Natasha assumed.

Alex avoided meeting her eyes and held his sister’s hand. They were young, surely not older than twenty years old, and they appeared a little bit scared, but also incredibly strong and close. Even with new, fresh clothes, and clean from the showers, both of the kids looked in distress - and very, very slim.

“What happened?” almost everyone asked. Bruce and Jane were the only ones not to, because they were organizing a plate full of fruit and two bottles of water.

“Don’t drink too fast,” Jane ordered, giving them everything with a smile. 

“And go slow with food. Malnutrition has to be treated with attention,” Bruce added.

“I’m-we’re not… We’ve been eating. Just… Not so much. We wanted to be sure the others had food first.”

Now they were both tense. The girl, Rey, was still silent, but looked ready to jump and run away. It was Alex, holding her hand, to keep her on the couch.

They were like frightened animals.

“What happened?” Natasha insisted.

Rey bit her lips and curled her fingers as to use her nails like they were claws.

Frightened animals, Bucky thought, that learned how to fight back.

Alex released the breath he didn’t know he was holding and looked at his feet, naked and full of cuts. 

“HYDRA,” he muttered. “That’s what happened. _HYDRA_.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER 2**

 

A crazy scientist had the great idea to try recreating a dinosaur, mixing his genes with the ones of some kind of bird - it had to be that way, because the result was more like a dragon than anything else.

Great.

Really.

The alarm made them suit up and go before they had the chance to ask Alex what he meant.

Even if it was pretty obvious.

Steve sighed and made sure the scientist was in SHIELD’s hands, smiling at Tony who was taking care of the press, helped by Natasha. Thor was waving at everyone he found cheering and Clint was collecting every arrow that had survived the fight. Bruce was already on the Quinjet, with tea in his hands and a blanket on his shoulders.

Steve was tired.

And curious.

He wanted to go to the Tower, and above all he wanted to find out what the kid meant.

What happened.

“Home,” he started saying. “We should…”

Tony grinned at him. “Not a word, Cap. Pepper will be here in two minutes. She’ll handle everything and we’ll be back _home_.”

It was, of course, Tony’s house and he had all the rights to call it “home”… But the fact that Steve thought about it in the same way caused him to have chills all over his body. “Friday?” he called.

“Miss Potts will be here in… Now, sir.”

So they went back to the Tower, where Bucky, Jane and Darcy had stayed to control Alex and Rey. They found them on the couch, watching the news as their lives depended on it, and when they realized the Avengers were there - hair still wet from the showers - Alex and Rey jumped on their feet, looking at the group with a relieved expression.

“You’re okay,” Alex murmured. He seemed surprised and so, so happy… It made Steve’s heart break a little.

“You doubted us?” Tony joked. He bent to look for his whiskey and Steve had to keep himself from drooling.

“Actually… Yes.”

Everyone went quiet.

“We’re dead,” Natasha stated.

Clint was still on his spot, while Darcy, who was probably twitting something, lowered her cellphone. “Oh,” she mumbled.

Bucky walked to her side and touched her arm, winking when she looked at him.

Steve frowned - he never realized that… He was an idiot. How could he not see… Natasha caught his eyes and chuckled. Bucky and Darcy?, he tried to tell her silently.

“I think we should all eat dinner and then go to sleep. We can talk about it tomorrow,” Bruce proposed.

“No way,” Tony answered.

“Friday has already ordered pizza, so in a few minutes we can eat - while we talk about the other universe.”

“Tony, I’m curious too,” Bruce admitted. “But we have all the time in the world.”

“No, we haven’t,” he argued. “I mean, yeah, but com’on!”

“There’s not a lot to say,” Alex groaned. He was holding his sister and Steve felt that, for once, he was doing it for himself and not for her.

“You okay, son?” he asked.

Maybe he shouldn’t have. Maybe he should have stayed quiet - because Alex’s entire body tensed and his eyes got filled with tears, that kind of tears that come from a man who never allows himself to cry.

His sister moved without a breath. She hugged him from the side and kissed his cheek, almost climbing him to reach it. She closed her eyes when Alex hugged her back.

“Sorry,” he murmured, repeating himself louder. “It’s just… We’ve been alone for years. It’s strange to be… I don’t know, it’s just strange to have someone ready to take care of you. Especially you, guys.”

“It’s okay,” Bruce smiled. “We understand.”

“I doubt it,” Alex continued lowly and only Steve and Bucky, with the enchanted hearing, were able to notice.

“Okay, so, HYDRA?” Tony grunted, pizzas now in his hands.

They sat and started eating in a curious silence, waiting for an answer. It was undeniable that the kids were immediately more tensed and it wasn’t hard to understand the reason.

Tony said they chose the most damaged world, the most damaged people… None of them could ever forget what the kids had been trough.

“I don’t really know where to start. I guess… I guess we can start with you. From here,” Alex murmured. “There was a cradle. You,” and he looked at Tony, “created a crib, a cradle. It was meant to hold a fetus for nine months… Until the baby was ready to… Be born.”

Tony was astonished.

A baby.

Had he wanted a kid?

Did he want a kid?

They cry and they smell… And he would never, ever be a good father. He didn’t even know where to start!

Steve patted him on the back. “Breathe, Tony.”

“Keep going, son,” he smirked at Alex, who blushed.

“One day, years after you built the cradle, HYDRA got into the Tower. They were inside the SHIELD, so I guess it wasn’t really hard for them…” his voice faded, as he was lost in his memories. “They stole a bunch of stuff. You were more worried about other things, but in the end… In the end it was the cradle, that gave more problems. They change it. An engineer, Hammer, change it for HYDRA.”

Natasha was writing something on a Starkpad; maybe a report, Tony thought. He was glad he had proves that this conversation had happened.

“HYDRA’s attacks got worse. More victims, more damages. Then un-Clint disappeared.”

Everyone looked at him and Clint froze, pizza in his mouth and his hands, and eyes wide open in shock.

“W-t a- ho-?” he asked.

“He means “what and how”,” Natasha supplied.

Rey was nodding, sad. She looked as she was about to talk, but she stopped almost choking on her words.

So she _can_ talk, Tony thought.

“How did it happen?” Steve inquired.

“We don’t know for sure. He, Daredevil and The Thing disappeared in a month… Then Ultron appeared.”

The room got filled with silence. No one was sure what to say, how to react… But Tony had to.

“I create it,” he murmured. “Not HYDRA. I mean, at least in this world - I created Ultron. It’s my fault.”

Rey and Alex looked at him like he was a ghost. Then surprise was taken over by sadness.

“I caused a lot of-”

“No,” Alex hissed. “No way. Not in our world, not for us. You didn’t, you…” there was panic in his eyes - and in Rey’s too. She was having difficulties to breathe.

“Rey, Rey! Relax,” Alex almost shouted, taking her chin between his hands. “It’s okay, he’s…”

“Ultron’s been taken care of. There’s nothing to worry about,” Natasha reassured them. She moved forward, looking at the kids’ eyes with an unreadable face.

“Wait. You mean Ultron is… Dead?”

“Yeah,” Steve smirked. “With Vision and the twins’ help we managed to destroy i-him? It? Anyway, we almost lost Pietro, but his dad arrived with the X-Men just in time.”

Alex’s face was full of shock. “Good. I mean. Glad to hear that.”

He looked like he was trying to convince anyone that he didn’t really care, - not more than the necessary - but all the Avengers were able to say that he did. His smile was screaming in joy.

“Yeah, so… Ultron’s dead. Tony - with Bruce’s help,” Steve added, refusing to look at any of them, “made a mistake, but we fixed it.”

The kids looked so relieved it hurt to look at them.

Rey, in particular, had her mouth slightly open. She was trying to talk again - and they all wondered how her voice would have been. But she did not speak; it was a painful scene to watch. All Steve wanted to do, at that point, was hold her and make sure she was okay. However, she was looking at Tony, tears in her eyes.

“You okay, kiddo?” Tony smirked.

Food was already finished and forgotten, and he had some cables and electronic pieces in his hands. He was playing with them, incapable of being still. She shot his fingers a look and, probably with all her courage, she took every little piece and started twisting them around.

“Ultron’s gone,” Alex was repeating. When the concept finally got under his skin, he turned to talk to his sister… And found out she had built a little robotic eagle; it moved its wings and Rey smiled, delighted.

“You’re good,” Tony nodded.

She blushed and hid her shaking hands - but almost everyone noticed it anyway. Tony studied the eagle and, after a thoughtful moment, he gave it to Steve. “It suits you,” he smiled.

Alex looked very conflicted for a second, before sitting back on the chair and smiling sadly.

“The story isn’t really… Well… Superheroes started disappearing, day after day. And then…”

“Then what?” Jane asked. “Then Ultron and his army showed up with Cyclops’ powers. Then with Mr. Fantastic’s.”

“He took the abilities of everyone he kidnapped?” Bucky murmured, making sure he understood well.

Alex nodded. “Kidnapped. Tortured. Experimented on.”

He took a deep breath.

“One by one.”

“After six months, only a few of you were still here, still fighting. Then…” he choked and shot a look at his sister, who was shivering. “Let’s say that… Your body,” and he nodded to Tony, “was found. Only Nat, Bucky, Bruce and… Steve were alive at that point. I mean in the Avengers.”

Rey patted her brother’s arm and made him look at her, moving her right hand as it was a needle.

“What?” Jane asked, incapable of stopping herself. Thor smiled behind her back.

“Yeah, right. HYDRA - or Ultron, they were connected - found a way to separate Bruce from The Hulk,” Alex murmured. He blushed from discomfort.

Everyone was quiet for a second.

Then chaos started.

“How is it possible?!” someone shouted.

“Someone created… Bruce, let’s go to the lab!”

“I’ll call Fury. If HYDRA knows how to do that, we have to know.”

“Guys,” Bruce smiled sweetly, stopping everyone to talk even more. “There’s no need. I don’t… I don’t want to have hope when in our world it’s impossible to…”

“ _It’s not_ ,” Rey smiled.

And her smile broke down in shock.

She covered her mouth with a hand, while the other clenched on her brother’s arm.

“You talked,” he murmured, shocked as she was. “Y-you talked! You haven’t done that in years, years! I ca-can’t believe it. You talked!” he shouted, jumping on his feet and forcing Rey to stand up as well.

He hugged her and danced and laughed, and it was so full of joy that it made everyone smile - or, in Darcy’s and Steve’s case, hide the tears.

“Talk again!” he ordered her. “Please.”

She stopped smiling at that.

It’s simple, Steve thought. That “it’s not” she blurted was totally unexpected, and just because she finally said something it didn’t mean she was now able to fully talk. Whatever made her silent was still there - it just broke down for a second.

“Why don’t you try again tomorrow?” Bruce proposed, still impressed and full of doubts at the same moment. “You really think you can help me?” he asked.

After a few moments of silence and doubt, Rey nodded. Then she shrugged, as to say “at least I’ll give it a shot”.

“Trust me, if someone can find a way, that’s Rey. And she studied some of HYDRA’s and Ultron’s files,” Alex smiled widely.

They shared a look and he bit his lips. “The least she can do is try.”

Bruce's eyes were filled with tears when he turned his face, doing his best to hide them.

“Impressive,” Tony giggled, amazed. Those kids were awesome… But how could she create a new serum, how could she be that smart?!

“What’s your IQ?” he blurted.

Alex answered for her.

“Couple of points less than yours.”

“And what about you?” Tony asked.

Steve shot him a look that said “no one cares, IQ isn’t all”, but Tony ignored him as a good Stark would have done.

“Not quite as much,” Alex admitted, “but still pretty good. I’m just… Not really into those things. I’m more of a… Tactical kind of clever.”

“Isn’t that funny?” Natasha smiled, looking at Bucky and Clint, who both turned so fast they almost snapped their own necks.

Bucky grinned when Alex blushed so much he became as red as Tony’s suit, while Clint was using ASL to talk to Natasha without speaking.

Unnoticed, Rey and Alex started to hold each other’s hand, breaking apart just in order to yawn.

“Why don’t you two go to sleep, and finish your story tomorrow?” Steve smiled, patting Alex’s knees and winking at Rey.

“Wait, what?” Tony exclaimed. “You can’t send them to bed! We want to know!”

“You made them come here from another universe, Tony! They need to rest. They’ll tell us tomorrow, no rush.”

“You kidding?!”

“ _Tony_ …”

“Okay, fine!” he looked at the kids, who were biting their lips as in an attempt to control themselves. “He spoils all the fun.”

Alex and Rey laughed quietly.

They all went to bed soon after that; the only one who didn’t go to sleep right away was Natasha. Standing still in the darkness, she hid her smile and kept thinking.


	3. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER 3**

 

“He called me _Nat_ ,” Natasha greeted the Avengers when they entered the kitchen, the morning after. 

Tony held a finger until he poured himself a cup of coffee; Thor got his poptarts, Clint and Steve their cereals. Bruce took his tea, while the others looked at her with confused expressions.

“And when talking about Clint he was saying something starting with “ _un_ ”, like he was going to call him “uncle Clint”. It’s not a coincidence, guys,” she continued at that point. “We thought they knew us from the news, but what if it was something more? I mean,” she turned to face Tony, “Rey basically has your IQ and Alex looks like your supersoldier version.”

Almost everyone had a puzzled look on their face, but Tony was nodding, moving his fingers restlessly as he always did. “You think they are either my kids, or the result of the cradle I created… Which would mean, you know, still Starks.”

Natasha smiled. “So you _are_ smart. Not just cocky.”

“Ouch,” he replied with a grin, “that hurt.”

“Wait,” Steve stopped them. “Are you saying that… They’re not just kids, but _your_ kids?”

“Sounds legit. Rey looked really shocked when they said that Tony’s body was found,” Bucky reasoned, eating his bacon with a shrug. “Maybe she found it - him - herself.”

They all spent a moment thinking about what that meant.

“If this is true,” Bruce said, a knowing look on his face, “then why are you not freaking out, Tony?”

Tony laughed, taking a sip of coffee while still giggling. “They’re not my kids.”

Clint frowned, glancing at his friends, who seemed to have his same thought. “Mh, yes they are?”

“From another universe,” Tony shrugged. “It’s not like I ever wanted them. I never signed up for this.”

“They are still your heirs, Man of Iron. You have responsibilit-” Thor remarked, but he was interrupted by Tony himself, who slammed a hand on the table.

“They are not my kids, heir or however you want to call them! In case you missed it, I never built a crib o-or a cradle for damn babies, I never wanted children, and if there’s something sure it’s that I will never be their father,” he exclaimed, standing up and moving his hands left and right with every word. 

Bruce murmured under his breath something that sounded like “here’s the freak out”, but Tony didn’t even notice, still blabbering.

“I’ve always been careful with condoms and chicks and all that shit, and now what, screw everything because of two underfed, super scared kids? No way, no fucking way! They’re not my kids, you hear me? I’m not their father, _their father is dead!_ As long as I’m concerned, they’re orphans.”

A stunned silence filled the room and it was just because of the lack of talking that the Avengers were capable of hearing a door slamming in the distance.

Friday’s voice jerked them on their places. “Sir, I believe our guests heard you.”

Tony paled and sat down with a huff, his face suddenly years older. “Well, _shit_.”

 

 

Later, when the scientists retreated to the labs, the others Avengers found Alex and Rey in the gym; they were both dressed in the sports stuff that was always in the locker room, for when they had agents visiting and someone wanted to spar.

The siblings were fighting each other, in a complex sequence of kicks, punches, gymnastic moves and headlocks that made Steve really proud - they sure knew how to defend themselves. There was something, anyway, that made him frown. The kids looked wrecked and every move was filled with anger and a lot of pain.

“Tony’s words really hurt them,” Natasha whispered after a few moments. Bucky, who was fixing his hair at her side, nodded.

“Hey, kiddos!” Clint shouted instead, making Rey turn immediately. Alex used her distraction to pin her on the ground, in an action that hurt a lot, judging by the girl’s expression.

“Never distract,” Alex scolded her. “Just a second and you’re dead, Rey.”

She nodded, panting hard, and he let her go, standing up and helping her to do the same.

“Again,” he exclaimed.

“I don’t really think they want to talk,” Steve mumbled. He decided to step forward anyway, stretching his muscles as best as he could; the others imitated him soon after.

After more than an hour of training, Rey ended up winning four times and Alex six - it was mostly a matter of height and weight, more than a real difference in fighting abilities.

“I think I’ve something to do with their style,” Natasha mumbled after a while.

“Same,” Bucky smiled. “We probably trained them.”

“Sounds logic,” Steve admitted in a whisper. “If they were my kids, I’d wanted you to teach them how to defend themselves.”

Clint snorted, stopping and glancing at the ground, where he was doing push-ups. “Thinking about children now?”

It was loud enough for Alex and Rey to hear it; they both shot Steve a look and he felt his cheeks burn.

“ _Shut up_!” he hissed, making Clint giggle. Then, because he couldn’t deny it, he bit his lips. “I- yeah, okay? _Yes_. I’ve been thinking about children, but just ‘cause… I don’t know, maybe not right away? I have time. But yeah, a couple of kids wouldn’t be bad,” he muttered. He glanced at Alex and Rey, and saw them leaving.

“Tony doesn’t understand his luck,” he sighed.

Thank God, no one laughed.

“We should see how he’s doing. He looked pretty upset,” Natasha said a couple of minutes after.

In the labs, Jane and Bruce were having a silent conversation with only their eyebrows - Darcy, chewing something in a corner, found it extremely funny. 

“I can basically hear you thinking,” Tony exclaimed after a little bit. “And I’d like you all to shut up.”

“You’ve been kind of an asshole,” Jane muttered.

“I never wanted kids, Foster. And you’re in my lab, remember.”

Bruce snorted and ate a cookie - in every place of the Tower there was food, hidden either by Tony or by Darcy; the first one wanted to piss Pepper off, since she tried so hard to keep everything in order, while Darcy just wanted to make sure “her scientists” ate something, once or twice per day.

“Okay, let’s make things clear: you wanted me to work in the Tower and yes, you’re technically my boss, but _we_ made them come here. They never asked for it. So stop being an asshole, okay? They may not be your kids in this world, but they sure as hell are in the other one.”

She took a long breath and nodded to herself. “And I have to tell you, Tony. You didn’t have them after a reckless night with some girl. You wanted them, okay? Yo-”

“You don’t know if I-”

“Of course we know! You created a cradle, Tony! A cradle! Just because you wanted so badly to have kids! It must mean something!”

“What! It doesn’t make sense!”

“It does if you had a partner who really wanted kids, but couldn’t,” Steve exclaimed, entering the lab with a tired smile. Tony lowered his head.

“You really think…” he mumbled.

Steve nodded. He realized in a few months after their first meeting that Tony liked both women and men, and after the way his relationship with Pepper ended Steve thought his next important story was bound to be with a man. 

Pepper never wanted to hurt him, everyone knew it.

But Tony needed constantly work and patience, and sarcasm and understanding. He needed someone who could feel that he almost died and that he saved New York and that yes, he didn’t act as the member of a team, but that it doesn’t mean it didn’t break him. 

Understand and feel what PTSD means. 

It would have made sense, anyway, to find a mechanical way to have a child with a man.

“I’m not telling you that you have to be a father now. I’m just saying that your… Other you… Loved them. And maybe you could love them too.”

People started leaving the room and Steve looked at them for a second, surprised. Why did they feel the need to let them talk alone?

“I’m… I’m…” Tony muttered, hiding his face in the hands. “I could never be a good father, Steve. I never really had one a-and-”

“It’s okay,” Steve smiled and patted him on the back. After a second of hesitation, he moved forward and hugged him. “It’s okay,” he repeated. “I’ll help you.”

And Tony, just like that, relaxed.

“Sir,” Friday interrupted them after a few minutes. “Our guests just asked me what metro line could take them as far as possible from here and what will the weather be in the next few days.”

Tony and Steve both frozen and frowned - then they looked at each other and started running.

“Friday, where are they?” Tony shouted.

“They are getting in the elevator on the common floor right now, sir.”

“Block it, Friday!” Steve ordered just when Tony exclaimed “stop the elevator!”.

It was good to know that they agreed on keeping the kids in the Avengers Tower.

They ran as fast as they could - and almost bumped in Thor, who was talking rather intensely with Bruce and Jane.

“Why isn’t the elevator working?” Alex snapped in that moment. Rey, big blue eyes open in shock, looked at Tony in pain.

“Listen,” he hesitated, “I know. I’m a mess… And the things I said? It’s bullshit! An-”

“It’s not! It’s not bullshit, you’re right, we are no one, for you - for any of you. You saved our lives, bringing us here,” Alex took a shaky breath, “and we owe you. The least we can do is disappear, so that you won’t have to see us again.”

He walked to the window, Rey by his side as always, and he opened the big glass door from which New York shined in all its beauty.

Steve stepped forward and so did the others, hands up in a _we-mean-no-harm_ way.

No one wanted to see them jump.

“Com’on, kiddo,” Tony muttered. “There’s no need to…”

Rey was crying, eyes locked first with Tony and then with Steve, and the latter exhaled in shock a breath he didn’t know he was holding. _How could I have been so blind?!_ , he thought, shocked - and he was probably right being so.

He coughed, looked down and looked back at Alex and Rey in a second.

“You’re not just Tony’s kids. Are you?” he asked, forcing himself to breathe.

“Steve,” Nat smiled after a second of hesitation, “he’s built like you. And she’s a smaller and more… Female version of you,” she said.

“You both have fifty percent of the Super Serum, haven’t you?” Bruce asked Alex and Rey.

Oh God, Steve thought. Not just one, but two.  
Siblings.

Two.

Kids.

Two!

“Cap, breathe,” Tony ordered, touching his arm, and it looked like the world had been turned upside down. Tony was now the calm one, and Steve was freaking out.

“You’re not just kids,” he repeated. “You’re my kids. _Mine._ I’m your…”

“Pops?” Alex supplied. “Yeah.”

“And Tony is your…”

“Dad.”

Steve nodded, still shocked. “That’s why he created the cri-cradle.”

Alex looked at his sister, and in a second Steve thought about how badly, the day before, he had wished to have a kid just like her. He was old and yet so young, and Alex and Rey came as a surprise - they came destroyed, from a world full of war and desperation. A world that left them with scars and nightmares.

“But, as I said, you don’t have to do anything. None of you have,” Alex murmured and he took another step toward the open door.

“Don’t!” was the last thing the Avengers were able to scream before Alex jumped, taking Rey with him.

 

Tony followed just a second after.

 

 

 

_“We have to come up with some sort of a plan, guys,” Steve exclaimed when Susan Storm finally got in the room. Professor Xavier, expression tired but determined, nodded, while agent Daisy Johnson - Phil’s pupil - snorted._

_“Any idea, Cap?” she sneered._

_Tony, by his husband side, shot her a look.“Why, kid, do_ you _have a solution?” he snapped._

_He was angry at himself for having let the cradle be stolen - not for creating it,_ never _for creating it._

_It gave them the most precious treasures they’ve ever had and even when the_ “accident” _had happened they had been happy. Scared, because two kids instead of one were scary, but happy anyway._

_In the first months of gestation there had been a problem in Alex cells; Tony, thinking that just giving him more of Steve’s blood wouldn’t have worked, had made sure another process was ready. Then Alexander was born… And, just a couple of months later, Reyna too._

_And now HYDRA created a monster with_ my _work._

_“Tony?” Steve called him, making him turn, surprised._

_“Sorry, you were saying?”_

_Steve smiled but his eyes were still full of worry, so Tony straightened up and nodded._

_“Sorry to interrupt,” agent Hill apologized without glancing up from her Starkpad. “There’s another victim.”_

_“Who?” Steve muttered._

_“Elektra.”_

_Tony froze, not because he really liked her but because… “She’s - she was pregnant.”_

_Hill nodded._

_“Fuck!” Steve yelled._

_Before Ultron, someone would have joked and told him_ “language!” _._

_That day, no one said a word._


	4. Chapter 4

 

**CHAPTER 4**

 

 

_“I don’t want the kids to know what’s going on more than they already do,” Steve murmured, looking at Tony to gather up strength._

_“I already know,” Alex said making them jerk. “And Rey does too, since she’s the one who hacked JARVIS.”_

_“And_ why _did she hack JARVIS?!” Steve asked; Reyna was more likely to follow the rules than her brother and he doubted she would have acted on her own._

_“Because I asked her to,” Alex replied. “I know what you think, but I want to fight by your side.”_

_“No,” was Tony immediate answer. “No way I’m letting you risk your li-”_

_“Don’t you think we’re already risking it? Being Captain America and Iron Man’s kids?!” he raised his hands and forced a smile. “I agree on leaving Rey out of this, okay? She’s… She’s just a kid - even if we’re actually the same age.”_

_“She’s smarter than you think,” Tony snapped without even wanting to._

_“You mean she’s smarter than_ me _.”_

_“Oh com’on, kiddo, that’s not what I said!”_

_“But that’s what you thought,” Alex smiled bitterly - he learned that from Tony._

_“Alex…” Steve hesitated, but it was already too late; the teen had just turned and ran away. “Tony…”_

_“_ You know _. You know I would never even think something like that.”_

_“I know, Tony. Maybe he just needs to remember it. Or maybe he needs to hear it more often.”_

_The genius nodded, then hid the face in his hands and shrugged. “Talking about Rey… I need to take her to MIT for graduation, tomorrow.”_

_“She still doesn’t want to tell Alex?”_

_“Look, Steve… I know how she feels. She’s scared everyone will hate her for being smarter.”_

_“So she still thinks I have no idea she’s taking college classes from here.”_

_“Kids,” Tony smiled._

_Steve smiled even more. “Kids.”_

 

 

Alex had jumped with such a grace that even Natasha had been impressed; more important, anyway, was that, well, he had jumped from the Avengers Tower, one of the tallest of all the buildings in New York. 

Even though he had taken Rey with him, almost forcing her to jump, she did it with the same nonchalance of her brother.

It was almost surprising the speed Tony had at that point. He ran towards the window, while pieces of his suit followed him and started composing on his body.

Thor, and Steve would have thanked him later for it, moved his hammer and followed suit.

“What the fuck?!” Bucky shouted, shocked. He then took a deep breath and shot Steve a look. “They really _are_ your kids.”

“Yeah, he once jumped out of a plane in order to avoid talking about his love life,” Natasha pointed out. She moved forward and sat on the couch, telling Friday to show her the videos from outside’s cameras - Bucky, pale as he could ever be, was stressing Steve about the reveal. 

No one looked really worried about the kids, trusting Tony and Thor.

“It’s impossible,” Darcy murmured at that moment.

“What?”

“Look.” 

She was watching the videos and one after the other, everyone in the room started doing the same.

“Jesus…”

“How is that possible?”

Bruce was already looking through Tony’s files, trying to understand if he had created… That, or if they did. Or, better, Rey. He doubted Alex could have done it, and absolutely not alone.

“Do you think it’s something they were born with?” Jane muttered after a moment.

“Everything is possible, from another world, isn’t it?” Clint stated.

They watched the videos, impressed and worried at once.

Tony, in the meantime, was flying as fast as he could, following his stupid-yet-genius kids all around New York’s sky. He could hear people scream at them in wonder, trying to understand what was happening. A few were already starting to hide, because of the two “bad guys” Iron Man was chasing - instead, some fans were already talking about the new superheroes and what their names were.

The fact is, Tony mused, that they really look like superheroes.

In the same moment he got out he had seen them change; a suit had started forming on their bodies, coming out from the inside, like it had been right under their skin - or in their blood… Some kind of nanotech, Tony supposed, that they - or, well, Rey - had mixed up to some sort of serum. In what other ways could their body had not rejected the technology?

And there has to be a sensor or something, he thought, so that the suit appears when they command. Just a thought and they’d be covered in the armor - not really like his; it looked thinner and more flexible, almost like a second skin, but able to fly.

“Stop!” he yelled when he got tired of flying around the city.

“Leave us alone!”

“Thor,” he called him after a moment of hesitation. “I need your help.”

That stopped the chase basically five seconds, a thunder and a “what the heck?!” later.

The kids had fallen on a skyscraper roof, one on top of the other, and the suits immediately started retreating, revealing Alex’s angry face and Rey’s worried one.

“Stop. Running. I mean it,” Tony ordered.

“Why! You don’t want us!” Alex yelled; Mjolnir was on Rey’s chest and she was on Alex’s, because in the same moment they had started falling, he had hugged her from behind and shielded her from the worst of the hit.

“I was… I was a jerk, yes,” Tony admitted, “but I was also really scared! You shocked me a little, okay?!”

Alex put his hands on Mjolnir and grunted, lifting it more and more as every moment passed. When Rey helped him, putting her hands on it too, they managed to move it on the side and sit.

“How…”

“They’re worth it,” Thor smiled. “Oh, Man of Iron, you and the Captain sure have great heirs!”

“Yeah, we do,” Tony replied, refusing to stop looking at Rey and, above all, at Alex. “Com’on. Let’s go back to the Tower. You still owe us your story,” he winked.

“Why should we?!”

“What do you want to do, uh? Run for your entire life? Because I’m sure as hell not going to stop chasing your and your sister’s ass.”

“It’s not like we ever stopped running in the last yea-” Alex almost shouted, but was interrupted by Tony, who was pointing his finger at Rey, while still looking at Alex.

“Did you at least ask her what she wanted to do?!”

That question had the power to stop his anger; he immediately turned to stare at her.

“I get that you go wherever the other goes,” Tony murmured - Thor, feeling an intruder, didn’t say a word. “But you lost us. This is a second chance, right?”   
Rey, head low not to stare anyone, nodded.

“And if you could just give me a chance, Alex, I… I could… Look, I can change. I can learn. Just, don’t run.”

He took a deep breath. “And Steve wants to know you, I-”

“You don’t know-”

“I know _him_! Just… Stay with us a little bit longer. You’ll be able to leave whenever you want, okay?”

“You just said tha-” Alex argued.

“I know what I said, just… Come back with us, okay?!” Tony snapped.

Rey was nodding; Alex, recognizing he had lost, did the same.

 

 

_“Rey?”_

_“Hey,” she smiled, letting her brother into her bedroom after hiding quickly MIT’s papers under her pillow._

_“I need to talk to you.”_

_“Sure.”_

_Alex paced back and forward for a few seconds, playing with his hands. “I know you’ll say no, at least at first, so I’m asking you to… Just to think about it, okay?”_

_Rey sat on her bed and Alex imitated her, collecting his courage and his thoughts. “I need your help.”_

_It wasn’t a common sentence, for him, not when she was involved. It had always been a hard relationship, the one they had. Rey was some kind of a genius and got along so well with Tony, with their shared love for robotics and science, while still being pops’ little girl; Steve didn’t understand her very well, but he was in love with someone just like her, so their bond was strong. The fact that she was for following the rules helped it a lot._

_Alex was different - he always felt different._

_He was more like Steve than like Tony from a lot of points of view, and he had always felt like the lab was Rey’s and dad’s kingdom… He didn’t belong there. His low - or, well, low compared to Rey’s - knowledge of robotics made him feel so different from Tony that it hurt. Instead, he had an amazing and basically perfect relationship with his pops, built on all the hours spent together, training and talking about fights and strategies and old missions._

_Alex was meant to work on missions, he felt it in his veins._

_“I want you to build me a suit. Not like dad’s, not really,” he said quickly, trying to stop Rey from answering “no”. “I want to be able to fight hand to hand. And it doesn’t need to shoot. It just… I guess fighting Ultron would be easier if I could fly like him,” he thought for a few seconds, silent. “What about that nanotech he was trying to build before the war started?”_

_“I can’t, Alex, I’m sorry,” Rey apologized._

_“Why not?!”_

_“It’s too diffic-”_

_“I know you can, you’re as smart as dad is!”_

_“I’m not even close as experienced as he is. He built a suit in a cave!”  
“But you’re not in a cave,” Alex smiled, “and I know you can. Just try, please! And don’t tell him.”_

_“Alex,” she murmured, “even if I could… It would take me months for a suit. And for the kind of nanotech he was planning to work on? Maybe years!”_

_“Rey…”_

_“I’m sorry. I can’t.”_

_Alex lowered his head, fists clenched and lips trembling with the anger._

_He left slamming the door, saying nothing else._

 

 

When the kids got back in the Tower, they almost ran to their bedroom - Tony, at first, gave them two, but they immediately refused to sleep without the other near. They also refused to come out for dinner and Steve, who knocked more than once on their door, had to retreat and leave them alone.

“Let them be,” Bucky suggested. “They have to process everything and it’s not something easy.”

“Don’t forget we all died, in their world,” Natasha added. “And we might have the same face, voice, body… But we’re not who they lost, not really.”

Bruce nodded, fixing the table with the others’ help. “When something like that happens to you… You don’t stop grieving, not for years.”

“But we don’t know what happened for real. Not entirely… And I’m so curious I could die!” Tony exaggerated.

They ate in silence, Tony and Steve looking at each other every second more frequently, the both of them thinking about the fact that _holy shit_ , they had kids! And not just that - they were in love, in the other world!

Maybe, Steve thought, this is the chance I was waiting for!

They cleaned the table and took out popcorn and sodas; Tony shot a look at his favorite whiskey, then thought better of it. He was going to try to be a kind-of-father. He didn’t want the kids to have an alcoholic dad.

The Avengers sat on the couches and picked a movie, just like tradition, and soon forgot about everything else but the protagonists and the crazy situations they were in.

When the movie ended, they all laid there for a few moments, thinking about nothing in particular.

“Do you think you could create a cradle to give birth to a baby? I mean in this world,” Clint asked from where he was buried under the pillows. Natasha, who was playing with his hair, stopped moving. 

Tony held his breath and looked at Steve, not knowing what to say, and relaxed only when he nodded. 

“Yeah, I guess I coul- I can. Why?”

“Nothing,” Clint lied. “It’s just something to think about, right?”

Natasha, silent as ever, started moving her hand again.

“Guys?” a voice stuttered from the door; Alex was there, looking way younger than he was in Steve’s pajama - he wasn’t quite as big as his “father” was. The expression on his face was broken, like he had fought against himself and cried and screamed.

Steve and Tony jumped on their feet, ready to help in any way possible, and Alex took the sleeves of the shirt he was wearing in his fingers, playing with them as to stop himself from reaching out. Steve walked forward and put a hand on his shoulder, smiling and nodding. “You okay, son?” he inquired.

“No?” Alex answered, doubting his own words.

“Kiddo,” Tony murmured, stepping forward too.

It was all it took for Alex to break down and start crying; he held onto Steve like he was a safe rock in a river of pain, until his hands began shaking so much he had to open them. Still, Steve didn’t let him go, rocking him like a baby.

“It’s okay,” Tony kept repeating.

“No, it’s not.”

“Then it’s gonna be okay. Maybe not now, maybe not tomorrow, but it’s gonna happen,” he insisted.

Bucky stood up and smiled. “And we’ll be here along the way, if you let us.”

“Totally,” Bruce added.

“We have your back.”

“You don’t even know…” Alex muttered.

“We don’t need to,” Steve answered, kissing his forehead in a way that reminded him of his own mother.

They stood there for a few minutes more, waiting for Alex to calm down, and when he did they made him sit on the couch, a blanket on his shoulders and Bruce’s tea in his hands.

“Rey?” Natasha asked him after a while.

“Asleep.”

He took a deep breath. “Which is good, because I want to tell you a little bit of how things went. And I don’t think she should listen to that. Live it again would only break her even more.”

He took a sip of tea and smiled sadly. “She wasn’t always like that, you know? She… But it doesn’t matter anymore,” he stopped himself.

“You told us everything until Bruce’s and the Other Guy’s… Division,” Bucky suggested.

Alex nodded and let the cup on the table, hiding his entire body but his head under the blanket.

“We actually have to start again from dad’s death. It was… You know, I’ve always had a better relationship with my pops, than with my dad,” he admitted. “While Rey the opposite. And she was so smart and she felt so guilty for it… Or at least that’s what I think. That must be the reason she told our dad and only him that she was going to graduate from MIT. We didn’t even know she was taking online classes.”

He breathed in and out for a few moments, lost in his thoughts. “I guess that’s why they went to MIT alone. Ultron was out there, but she had to go and it was her and dad’s secret, so…”

“So we went without further protection,” Tony assumed.

“Yeah,” Alex nodded, every memory from that day dancing in front of his eyes. Tired as ever, he started talking.

 


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

 

_“Pops, can we talk?”_

_“Of course,” Steve forced a smile, closing every window open on the Starkpad in order to hide the reports about Ultron’s new victims. “About what?”_

_“I want to fight by your side,” he proclaimed._

_“Alex, we already talked about this.”_

_“Yeah, and I heard you, I just don’t think you’re right!”_

_“Okay, listen well, son, w-”_

_“I know,” Alex interrupted him, “you’re trying to protect me, but think about everyone who’s out there, waiting for a hero to save them - a hero that will never come, not if there’s such a small number of you left! You need new recruits and I’m telling you_ I’m ready _.”_

_Steve sighed and look down at his Starkpad, thinking about all the reasons that made it a wrong choice, and how fast his son would have died out there._

_“No,” he snapped. “No way.”_

_“But pop-” Alex started lamenting, just to be immediately interrupted by JARVIS._

_“Sir, I have reasons to believe MIT has been attacked.”_

_Steve paled and started running to the roof, shouting “JARVIS, call everyone!”. Alex followed him, already thinking about his dad - he was the only one who had a reason to be there, after all._

_“You’re not coming with us!” Steve stopped him once on the roof. Natasha was already in the pilot seat and the rest of the Avengers - who was left - was getting in the jet._

_“We can’t leave him here alone,” Bucky argued, winking at Alex when Steve nodded, defeated._

_“Dad doesn’t have back up,” the kid murmured after a few seconds. “Why doesn’t he fly away as fast as he can?!”_

_Steve didn’t even turn, pale and sweating. “Rey’s with him.”_

 

 

“You didn’t want me to get down the jet, but when we got there we realized there was no point in worrying. Ultron was no longer there.”

Alex breathed heavily, looking first at Steve then at Tony and the rest of the group, all listening very carefully.

“Everything was destroyed. It was… It was horrible, with all those people laying there, covered in blood an-” he stopped, biting down a cry.

“Aunt Nat found you,” and he nodded towards Tony, “in someone’s office. At first, pops tried to stop me from getting in, but as soon as he saw you he forgot everything else but, well, you.”

A little pause. “It wasn’t pretty. It really wasn’t.”

 

 

_Tony’s suit was opened up as it was a simple can and where his body was visible, it was covered in blood. The arc reactor had been taken away from his chest, where there was a hole too big to be just the one from the reactor. With a wave of nausea, Alex realized his dad didn’t have his heart anymore._

_The rest of his body was just as destroyed._

_Alex didn’t realize he was crying until he felt Natasha’s hand on him. “Let’s get you out of here,” she murmured, but he didn’t even turn to look at her; his eyes were fixed on his dad’s hand, open in the direction of a closet, in the right corner of the room. He wanted to reach out and touch him, ask forgiveness for all those times they had argued and he had made him feel anything less than a great father._

_He wanted to cry and scream and fall asleep never to wake up again._

_“He’s dead,” he murmured._

_Steve, who was sobbing on Tony’s body, barely moved. “You shouldn’t have seen this,” he mumbled._

_I’m looking at my father’s body, Alex thought, scrolling Natasha away._

_He then gasped loudly. “Pops, pops!”_

_Steve, face like the one of a zombie, looked at him. “Alexander, I’m so s-”_

_“I’m looking at my dad’s body.”_

_“Alex, I know it’s a shock…”_

_“No, just, fuck! Listen to me!_ I’m looking at my dad’s body! _”_

_“Pleas-”_

_“I’m looking at my dad’s body! Why am I not looking at my sister’s body too?!”_

_Steve’s expression, at that point, shifted. Pain gave space to panic and in a second he was on his feet, covered in Tony’s blood but mind focused._

_A little knock made them all turn - just in time to see the closet door open. Rey was there, a mechanical object in her hands, and was staring at their dad’s body, whose hand was pointing right at her - almost as he had tried to reach her, to calm her down in an empty promise of a happy ending._

_Steve hugged her like his life depended on it, but Rey didn’t hug him back, too focused on the little thing in her hand._

_“What’s that?” Bucky asked in a whisper._

_“Tony built it. It creates a kind of shield to stop your warmth to be spotted. He thin- he thought,” Steve sobbed, “that it would have helped a little bit against Ultron.”_

_He hugged Rey again. “And it - he saved your life.”_

 

 

“We got back to the new place we were living in - we couldn’t use the Tower, it was too easy to hit - and I remember very little of that moment. Just that you told uncle Bruce what happened on the jet, so that when he started turning from the pain you… Threw him off. I think uncle Bucky helped me shower because I wasn’t… Rey and pops… Who knows.”

He smiled sadly. “I remember something, though. Aunt Nat was in the kitchen with uncle Bucky and she… She said that Rey had seen everything that happened to dad. That she wouldn’t talk about it - that she wouldn’t talk at all. She never did, after that day.”

He laughed without any kind of joy. “I tried. Oh, God, if I tried.”

 

 

_“Please,” he cried, touching her cheeks in a way that reminded her of their dad - just the thought made her jump._

_“Please, Rey. Please, I’m begging you. What happened yesterday was… And I need to hear your voice. I need my sister, I need you to talk._ Just say something! _”_

_She lowered her head, ashamed of being so broken, and didn’t answer._

_“Fuck!” Alex yelled, punching the wall. He then hugged her and cried on her head._

_That night, when everyone but JARVIS was sleeping, she entered his dad’s lab and let every negative emotion destroy her from the inside. Only then she bent and took out a few things from a box._

_Nanotech, she pondered and promised herself she would have created for Alex the first suit able to form just from a thought, coming from inside a body. Mixing it with the super serum… it could have worked._

_He won’t have my voice, she thought, but he’ll have an armor like no one else in the entire world._

 

_Her dad’s voice echoed in her mind, painfully as the last hundred times she remembered it._

_“Hide here, sweety, and don’t come out unless the battle is over and one of the Avengers is here. And please, for the love of whoever is out there, don’t make a sound. Don’t talk, don’t scream, please. Whatever happens, stay quiet. It’s important, you have to stay quiet. Not a sound, okay? Stay quiet.”_

_It was the last thing she heard him say before he started screaming._

 

 

The next morning Alex woke up to find himself still on the couch, extremely warm. He turned his head a little bit and noticed he was between Steve, eyes open in a sweet expression, and Tony, still asleep.

“Hey,” Alex murmured.

“Hey,” Steve answered. “You want to sleep some more time, kid?”

He didn’t get the chance to choose, anyway, because Tony - eyes still closed - hugged him and forced him to stay still. “Sleep,” he mumbled.

When he woke up again, Alex found Rey squeezed between himself and Tony, Steve’s arm trying to hug them all. A whispering and the sound of glasses and cups were coming from the kitchen, but there was no way for him to untangle himself.

“Hungry?” Steve asked.

“You didn’t sleep,” Alex noticed. “Why didn’t you move, then?”

“I wanted to enjoy this.”

“While it lasts?”

Steve got immediately serious. “ _It will last._ We’re here. We’re not going anywhere.”

“Promise?” Alex murmured and his eyes opened with a soft expression that reminded Steve of a child - a child he, in another world, had wanted desperately.

“Promise,” he said and Tony mumbled the same, breathing in the sweet scent of Rey; she was starting to wake up, yawning and moving to sit up.

“When did you get here?” Alex asked her and she shrugged, moving her head in their bedroom’s direction.

“Oh, you woke up and I wasn’t there. Sorry ‘bout that.”

She kissed his cheek and stood up, almost running to Natasha and her pancakes. “You like cooking?” she asked.

Rey shook her head. 

“You like eating?”

She nodded, gleeful. 

“Okay, then! Here.”

They all sit down at the table, a sleepy Alex trying to make his hair lose the pillow look.  
“I actually wanted to talk about it, later,” Bruce said from behind his cup of tea. 

Steve shot him a worried look. “About what?”

“Food. I’d like to give the kids a full medical examination and talk about creating them a diet,” he announced. “Underfeeding is an issue.”

“We’re not underfed.”

“I didn’t mean to be harsh,” Bruce added, hiding his hands into the sleeves of the shirt he was wearing. “I’m just worried.”

“I know,” Alex smiled softly, “but we’re not underfed. We ate. Maybe not a lot, but still. It was just… We tried to give everyone food first.”

“Everyone?” Steve inquired.  
Rey shrugged.

“Long story,” Alex mumbled, taking a bite of a pancake. It’s not that he didn’t want to talk about it, but… It felt distant. Like a dream, almost - or a nightmare. Or, even worse, like this new life, with the Avengers and all the commodities of a world without war, was the dream - and one day, who knows when, he’d wake up to Ultron’s cold hands around his neck. His sister’s blood all over the place. That monster’s smirk looking down at him.

“Guys,” Darcy interrupted them, moving fast her thumb on the screen of her Starkphone. “We kind of have a situation? Which is not a real situation, nothing bad, just… People, you know?”

Everyone stared at her, confused, while she moved her hands in every direction.

“What’s the problem, Darce?” Bucky asked sitting down by her side. 

Steve hid a smile.

“It’s world trading hashtag all over the social medias. Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Facebook and all that jazz,” Darcy continued.

Natasha nodded, realizing what it was all about. “Yeah, S.H.I.E.L.D. and about a dozen countries’ leaders - ours too - called this morning to find out more.”

“Of what?” Steve exclaimed; he didn’t like not knowing what was going on. How was he supposed to protect the team if he didn’t have all the information?

“Of them!” Darcy blurted, pointing a finger at Alex first, and then Rey. “They all saw Iron Man chasing them, yesterday, and they have questions!”

“So we have to figure out what to say,” Tony shrugged. “I don’t see what you’re all anxious about. Well just say they’re the new Avengers recruits.”

“Yes!” Alex shouted, hands in the air in a winner gesture.

Steve didn’t look as happy. “Tony,” he said in his best Captain voice.

Tony winced.

“Okay, we’ve done worse than being Avengers, in our world! And honestly, even before your death I wanted to join!” Alex explained, kicking Rey’s foot under the table to make her join in his happiness. She jumped, surprised.

“We didn’t let you - or am I wrong?” Steve inquired.

Alex looked at the ceiling. “You’re not wrong, but I was young, a lot younger than eighteen, to be honest. And I didn’t have the suit! Or the real-life training I have now!”

He looked so excited, so happy and eager to help, that Steve actually felt he was looking into a mirror. He thought about how many times he had tried to join the army, lying again and again and again.

“Okay. But first you have to prove me you can be an Avenger.”

“Just say the word, Pops,” Alex smirked, before even registering his own words. He winced and got back on his seat, retreating and putting as much space as he could between him and Steve. “I didn’t - I didn’t mean…”

“It’s okay,” Steve said quickly, eyes dry but heart crying. Just a simple “pops” and his chest felt too little to contain his heart, his joy, his love.

He turned to see Tony and found him already looking at him, the sweetest expression on his face.

“I think-” he started saying, only to be interrupted by Clint, who was staring at Rey. 

“So… What’s the rest of your story?” he asked. “Because it kind of feels like it’s a tv series or a book and this are episodes or, I don’t know, chapters. And I don’t want your story to take an entire season.”

“Excuse me,” Tony snapped, only half joking, “they deserve an entire show! And a beautiful season finale.”

“Cut it out,” Steve ordered, taking a sip of coffee.

“I mean,” Tony continued, “I know I’m probably the most curious one, but there’s no need to talk about sad things, right now. We’re having breakfast!”

“When did you start cari-”

“Right now,” he hissed, ending the discussion. He was trying to be _good_ with the kids, which meant doing his best to understand and respect their feelings and… Fuck, he was going to fail so badly, in this _thing_.

He looked up from his breakfast and found Rey staring at him, smiling sweetly.

Maybe, he thought in a wave of surprise and pride, _just maybe_ , I could be good enough.

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

CHAPTER 6

 

They spent the next few days trying to get to know each other; it was weird, for the kids, to talk again with people they lost so long before and, more than that, to see in them those they loved and strangers at the same time. They had the same faces, same manners, same voices… But they were different people, with different pasts. 

The fact that Tony and Steve weren’t a couple, too, was weird - and at the same time, a little voice in Rey’s head suggested that maybe that was the reason the world was at peace. Maybe, in their universe, the superheroes’ love had been the cause of all the destruction and the deaths. It felt absurd, because how could it be possible, how could something as good and pure as two people’s love for each other create such chaos. Such pain.

That didn’t mean, anyway, that she couldn’t see the way they kept looking one another.

She was mute, not stupid.

And that was the exact reason why she was in her da- no, Tony’s, _her real father was dead!_ \- lab, trying to recreate the serum HYDRA had injected Bruce. She was trying as hard as she could and everyone knew it; even Bruce, who kept doing breathing exercises to calm down and control his impatience, saw it.

And so they all worked near each other, Bruce pretending not to care about the success of the serum, Rey pretending not to see his anxiety and her da-Tony, damn it, _Tony!_ ’s proud eyes on her… And Tony himself pretending not to be totally over the moon for his daug-no, his… His _what?_ , he thought after a second. Adoptive daughter? 

She surely felt like she was his. Alex too, of course. 

He didn’t know the entire story, but for what Alex told them about his death, well… He had screwed their relationship up, somehow. He didn’t make him feel loved enough, or good enough, or… Or just enough anything.

He wanted to make it right, this time around.

Which is why he had taken the entire day for them alone, the day before; they had flown and dived in the ocean and then eaten donuts on the other side of the city, watching the sunset.

Yeah, it had been great.

In the meantime, Natasha, Darcy and even Pepper, who now knew the entire story of the universe-experiment, had taken Rey for a girls-only day, Tony’s credit card in the hands and basically every boutique’s director ready to help them - and their money - in every way.

The truth was that almost every Avenger had tried to occupy the kids’ days, going out or in the labs or in the training rooms, to minimize Steve’s absence.

He, in fact, had gone outside the State on a mission with Sam and Bucky, and had yet come back.

Day after day, they waited.

Alex got more impatient every hour that passed, Rey more moody and distracted- the third time she burned herself, Tony threw her out of the lab and banned her from working in it “ _until farther notice, you heard me?!_ ”.

“Tony’s not angry, you know that, right?” murmured Bruce a couple of minutes later, while patching her wound under Alex’ icy eyes. You could feel his anger and fear coming in waves from his body, but he was actually still as a statue, Tony’s classic poker face on and Steve’s way of crossing the arms in a sort of judging way. 

“He’s worried for Steve, for himself if Steve doesn’t come back,” Bruce looked at them and their faces, full of panic, “but _he will_ , of course he’ll come back!” he said quickly.

Rey and Alex looked at each other, silently.

“I _swear_ , he will,” added Bruce, mentally kicking himself. “I was just saying that Tony was already worried and then you got hurt on his watch and he’s probably blaming himself and he’s also probably freaking out ‘cause he thinks he’s never gonna be good enough to take care of you alone, without Steve, and… You know what?” Bruce exclaimed seeing their expressions. “I’m shutting up now.”

“That would be better, yeah,” agreed Steve in that second, walking into the room still in his costume, dirty of mud and blood, eyes tired but a smile on his lips.

In a moment, Alex and Rey threw themselves at him, hugging him as their lives depended on it.

“I know we should have gone to shower,” Sam said smiling as well, “but Steve insisted to come here first.”

“And we just couldn’t miss the scene,” Bucky added, feeling his heart full of affection for those kids and, above all, for his best friend. He had a “proper” family now, a good one too, and Bucky was just vibrating happiness for him.

“You’re back,” Tony murmured appearing from the hall. “Good - I mean, well, you know…”

“Bucky!” Darcy interrupted him from behind his back, a smile almost as big as her face was. Bucky laughed and hugged her, kissing her forehead.

“Sam!” Sam cried, hugging himself. “I missed you so much, man! Me too! How was the mission? Oh, you know, same old bloody stuff, but the thought of coming back to you… Oh, Sam, you’re so sweet! I love you so much, Sa-”

“Okay,” Steve laughed, “we got it.”

“Yeah,” he snorted, “I bet you’re gonna get i-”

“ _Sam!_ ” the room erupted in a yell, followed by laughter and, for someone, a lot of embarrassment.

“I’m gonna shower now,” Steve announced shooting Sam an angry look. He then realized Rey was still holding him like a koala would with a tree. “Hey, princess,” he called her, “you should let me go.”

When she shook her head, he silently asked Alex for help; he hugged Rey and took her hands in his, forcing her to let go of Steve and pressing her onto his body at the same time. She grunted, but didn’t otherwise complain while the three men went showering.

“Let’s go to the living room,” Tony murmured - what he actually thought was _I need a drink_.

A yell made them all jump. “Tony!”

“Oh oh,” he said.

“Tony, you bastard!” swore again the voice. The man whom it belonged to arrived a second later and Tony tried to hide behind Thor, who just got into the room.

“Com’on, Rhodey, chill!” 

“Chill? Chill?! You created a fuc- _freaking_ portal!” he corrected himself seeing Rey. “And I had to find out _from Pepper_ that you have kids now!”

Tony paled, turning to see their reaction, but both of them just giggled.

Sometimes it was almost like they were getting younger every day they spent there, safe and with adults taking care of them. Like they let themselves be relaxed like normal kids should have been - they were older, now, after all.

“Now, you two,” Rhodey called them, “wow! Just wow! You are super cute,” he smiled to Rey, “and you look just like some sort of upgraded version of Tony.”

“Hey!”

“Shush, I’m still mad at you.”

He smiled again and clapped once his hands. “Now, show me those suits of yours.”

That’s how Steve found them; all in the living room, testing first the suits and then showing Rhodey that they could actually lift Thor’s hammer - it still made everyone beam in pride.

“So, were you the only Avengers’ kids?” Rhodey asked after a while, sitting on a couch. 

The others turned to look at him, surprised; no one had thought about asking them such a question and now they all felt stupid.

“No,” Alex answered after a deep breath. “We were four.”

Rey hit him her elbow and he jumped. “What?”

She pointed at Darcy.

“Oh God, yeah, sorry. Five.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Darcy forced a laugh, in tension.

“We’re sorry,” Alex answered, eyes on the floor. “You were pregnant, when… W-we’re sorry.”

“Oh,” was all she managed to say. She let herself fall on the couch and immediately hugged Bucky, feeling more vulnerable than ever. He kissed her cheek, holding her.

“What about the others?” Steve asked, voice hard.

“Well, there was Bobby. He was a mutant, he was going to Xavier’s school, but aunt Nat and uncle Clint had basically adopted him. He had a great power,” he smiled to himself, lost in his memories. “He disappeared not long after uncle Clint. Aunt Nat was…”

He coughed, eyes filled with tears. “We didn’t ever realize Xavier’s school had been attacked, you know? But one day Ultron’s robots could absorb and channel solar power just like Bobby… And so we knew.”

He looked first at Natasha and then at Clint. “He was a great friend for both of us.”

They didn’t answer, but their eyes showed the pain they were feeling - the pain of something you never knew, but wanted, that’s ripped from your hands.

“You know what? We shouldn’t talk about this,” Tony declared, taking a sip from the glass of scotch he had previously taken - once in a while couldn’t hurt.

“You said you were five,” Rhodey ignored him.

“Brienne,” Alex hissed, sounding both angry and in pain at the same time. Rey, by his side, gave him a pat on the back. 

“You had started fighting Ultron on your own, flying all over the world to help as much as you could,” Alex fumed, pointing a finger at Thor.

“Isn’t it good?” Jane asked.

“It was, yes, but we were trying to survive and to protect a bunch of people, when you died. And Brienne, your- _his_ daughter…”

He stood up, pacing back and forth in distress. Rey, still on the couch, followed him with her eyes.

“I don’t know what happened. A second we were all there, hiding and planning a way to fight, and the second after the fucking bridge to Asgard was open and Brienne was gone. That thing closed as soon as she disappeared, but it had alerted every Ultron’s robot in miles. Miles!” he was moving his hands, so angry that the veins on his neck and arms were standing out. “We lost fourteen people, that day. Fourteen. Good. _Kids!_ ”

Rey bit her lips, eyes low.

“And all because, with you gone, Asgard needed to save its only heir to the throne.”

Thor nodded. “Yeah, it’s a monarchy.”

“ _It’s a massacre_. That’s how I call fourteen corpses.”

He stood facing the window and watched the breathtaking view; he had missed it for so long, that more than once he’d find himself just absorbing it as much as he could.

“It took us so long to find those people, those survivors. At first we-we thought we were alone.”

“How did you find yourselves alone?” Steve asked.

“You were all out, trying to fight this new Hulk out of the city and avoid most of the destruction - almost pointless, because half of New York was already dead or locked up. Ultron had found a way to foresee who would have had mutant kids in the future, so he would either kill them or take them someplace no one ever found,” he explained after a while in silence. “So, we were waiting for you to come back… And you just never did.”

 

 

_“Sir, I am sorry to inform you that I no longer receive vital signals from Agent Romanoff, Agent Barnes and Captain Rogers. It looks like this new version of The Hulk, separated from Doctor Banner, is stronger than they expected.”_

_Rey cried out, falling to her knees and losing the grip on the pen she was holding. She started sobbing and Alex, shivering, took her in his arms._

_“It’s gonna be okay.”_

_It’s not, he thought instead. Pops is dead. Everyone is dead._

_And now we will die too._

_“Sir, g-go t-”_

_“JARVIS?” Alex called him. “JARVIS?!”_

_“I- hacke- Ult-n is comi-”_

_“Fuck!” Alex yelled before forcing Rey, still crying, to stand up. “We need to run. I think dad still had a couple of suits in his lab, we need to get there. Okay?”_

_She looked at him, eyes full of tears._

_“I’ll take care of you, Rey, I promise. But now we run and we run_ fast _. Okay?”_

_They turned in the same moment the base started collapsing. Wall after wall, room after room._

_“Find them all,” said a metallic voice not too far away._

_They ran as silently and quickly as they could, crying for the paralyzing fear of being found, of being chased, hunted like animals._

_We’re just sixteen!, he would have liked to scream, but he knew they wouldn’t have cared._

_They got to the lab just as one of Ultron’s robot lowered himself from the hole it made in the upstairs floor and started shooting at them._

_“Go, go, go!” Alex yelled pushing Rey in front of him._ I’ll die before I let something happen to her _, he thought. Then, selfishly, he added “there’s no way I’m staying in this world all alone”._

_He closed the lab’s door, which was reinforced and would have last at least a couple of minutes - or so he hoped -, then he ran to the suits._

_And they all blew up, revealing Ultron’s robotic smirk while he flew into the hole of the wall._

_This is it, he thought walking backward to put as much space as possible between himself and Ultron._ This is how I die.

_And then he saw the window, blasted open._

_If we die, at least it won’t be by its hands - at least we’ll die flying._

 

 

“I was ready to die. What I didn’t know is that Rey had actually worked on the nanotech,” Alex smiled proudly and she blushed, shooting a shy look at Tony.

“She wasn’t sure it would have worked, but in the second we got into the lab, while I tried to get the old suits, she took the serum and the technology. She actually wanted to only give it to me,” he laughed quietly. “But I screwed her plans up.”

 

 

_Alex took Rey’s hand - the one that wasn’t holding… Needles?! What the heck? - and ran to the window, shielding her as much as he could. A blast hit him in his back and he heard Rey scream, which meant he didn’t shield her enough, but it didn’t really matter, anymore._

_Even though the throbbing pain, he saw they were falling, fast, to the ground._

_And then a needle was pushed in his neck._

_“What the f-” he started cursing, but everything went black for a second. He lost his grip on Rey, who screeched and took something shiny from her pocket.  
Who cares?, Alex thought, delirious. We’re falling to our deaths._

 

 

“Next thing I know, I’m about to vomit and I feel more powerful than ever… And I can fly,” Alex shrugged, biting his nails. “So I immediately fly to Rey, even if I don’t even know how I’m alive or flying or, yeah, _alive_ , and I’m feeling weird and heavy, but Rey’s falling really fast and I need to reach her. I’m a few feet away when _boom_ , she’s covered in a black suit that came from nowhere. And then I know. Fucking nanotech.”

Steve shot him a look. “Language.”

Ignoring him, Alex turned to smile at Rey. “I’m damn proud of you, you know that, right?”

Rey smiled widely and hugged him tightly. “ _Me too,_ ” she whispered in his ear.

And if his eyes filled with tears, well… No one was going to judge him.

 

 

 

 

* * *

I really like this chapter :P


	7. Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7

 

“Mr. Stark! Mr. Stark! Over here!” a woman called loudly, moving her hand to gain the superhero’s attention.

He gave her a nod.

“Why aren’t the new recruits here?”

Every journalist in the room straightened up, eyes on the Avengers’ table; after all, that matter was the reason for the conference.

“Why,” Tony distracted them with a smile, “you want to get rid of me?”

Someone laughed, many smirked. The same woman of before looked at him, pensive. “Their hero-names are _Legend_ and _Hush_ , is it right?”

The Avengers nodded. Alex had said it was the name they were known as, in their universe, and all the group had thought it was a good idea to hide their identities and just use their codenames - at least at first.

In the meantime, Tony was working on the kids’ fake identities, on the school they’ve been to, their born certificates etc, because he was adamant about protecting them from any kind of doubt. If someone found out the truth… He didn’t even want to think about it. 

Experiments. Interrogations. Maybe other portals, even.

I’ll shield them, he promised himself.

“Is it true that they’re orphans?”

Tony stiffed without really meaning to.

“I don’t see why it matters,” Steve intervened, “but yes, they are. They lost their parents in the battle of New York.”

They chose to use that excuse as the reason why the kids had decided to join the Initiative, because a lot of people died, that day, and them seeing their parents get killed by aliens and wanting to save others from the same fate was a good story - one that could hold in front of the press.

“So we can almost say that the Avengers adopted them?” another journalist asked.

“They’re both legal adults,” Tony answered, coldly. He didn’t like where the conversation was heading.

“Yeah, but emotionally? They’re a lot younger, right?”

That was actually the reason why he was working on giving them the surname _Young_ : a little inside joke he couldn’t resist to. _His_ younglings.

“Does it feel like a parents-children relationship?”

“Well,” Steve bit his lips for a second, taking the question on himself, “I think all of us, even just for a matter of age gap, feel a sort of protectiveness toward them.”

“Just?” the journalist repeated. “Are there other reasons?”

“It’s a matter of experience too,” Natasha said firmly, still as ever on her chair. She looked the man who had asked the question right into the eyes until he lowered his, and then she grinned. 

“And why aren’t they here now?” asked someone else.

“The second you take a picture of their faces, they’re going to be stressed on all kind of media. We thought we’d save their identities for as long as we could,” Tony answered.

It was actually yes, a way to protect their identities for a little bit, but also a way to buy him time to _create_ those identities. He needed to do an accurate job, if he wanted to keep them safe.

 

“You’re back,” Alex murmured from his spot near the window, when the Avengers made their return to the Tower. He moved to hug Steve and then he hesitated, looking briefly at Tony before hugging him too.

Tony strengthened his grip on Alex and smiled softly at Steve, who however didn’t notice, too busy trying to understand where Rey was.

“She’s in the lab,” Alex said and went to the kitchen, to take a drink from the fridge. He had started acting more and more like it was the house he left years before, the one he missed so badly, and it was weird and it made him feel guilty, but it was nice at the same time. 

It felt like home.

_While it lasts, of course_ , he thought.

“Alone?” Steve wondered.

“With Bruce.”

Bruce, who didn’t go to the press conference because Ross was still planning ways to arrest him, so it was better not to get too much attention.

“I actually wanted to talk about him,” Natasha murmured, touching lightly Steve’s shoulder. She then turned to Alex. “When HYDRA separated The Hulk from Bruce… What happened to him?”

“HYDRA killed him,” he answered after a second. “But it was HYDRA, not the serum.”

“And The Hulk?”

“What about him?” Steve asked, trying to understand where the conversation was heading.

“Was he in any kind of control? If Rey succeeds and she manages to… What is going to happen?”

“We will face it,” Tony replied coldly. “Because there’s no way in hell we’re going to take from Bruce the chance to have the life he wants.”

“I’m not say-”

“It doesn’t matter,” Bruce intervened, walking into the room with a weird look in his eyes. Rey, behind him, was on the verge of tears. “It’s not her fault,” he added for her benefit.

She went straight to Alex and hugged him, refusing to meet Tony’s eyes; after a few seconds, she left her brother to hold onto Steve, who kissed her forehead.

“She actually helped me a lot,” Bruce smiled and it was sincere, even though the disappointment was still strong and fresh on his face. “We created a serum that, when injected, will stop me from changing for things like a fast heartbeat - I’m still not sure what would happen with a mortal wound. It should last for no more than an hour each shot, because after that my cells return to normal… And I can’t take it every day, I’m afraid - but it’s a lot.”  
“Well, wow!” Clint exclaimed. “It’s amazing!”

“Yeah!” Bruce laughed and in a second his eyes filled with tears. “I never thought I’d be able to… It’s just… It’s amazing.”

He smiled at Rey, who was partially hidden in Steve’s chest. “You’re amazing. Really.”

She shook her head and bit her lips. She had really thought she could have… But she couldn’t. She wasn’t prepared enough. 

_The only thing I’m good at is being smart - and now I failed_ , she thought.

“You did great!” he repeated.

She smiled weakly, hoping to stop anyone to reach out and try to make her feel better. 

“How about we go out?” Steve proposed in her ear. “Just the two of us.”

Rey nodded, before shooting a dubious look at Alex, who shrugged and moved his head, as to say “go”.

Steve smiled and took her hand, leading her to the elevator after winking at Tony.

“Okay,” Tony mumbled, surprised, and he turned toward Alex. “Movie?”

In the garage, Steve led Rey to his bike and laughed at her amazed expression. “Did I have one in your world too?”

She nodded.

“Did I ever took you for a ride?”

She shook her head.

“But I did it with Alex… What if we make this something ours, from now on? Something that has nothing to do with your old life?”

Rey smiled widely and got on the bike, hugging Steve from behind. “Okay, princess,” he said, “never stop holding me.”

They drove for some time, no destination in mind, just to absorb the wind and the view of the sun beginning to set in New York, and only when Rey started shaking for the cold Steve stopped. He felt alive, like sharing that hour of wandering with his… His what, daughter? Adoptive daughter?, like sharing that hour with her had connected them, had made their relationship stronger.

It’s because I’m creating new memories, he thought. It’s because I’m _me_ , now, and not some other version of me I can’t even remember, and this _me_ is totally over the moon for the kids.

His chest ached.

_Mine_.

They’re mine.

He parked and waited for Rey to get off the bike, before doing the same. She looked at him with a weird face and she observed the street they were in.

“We’re in Brooklyn,” he smiled. “And that?” he pointed at the building in front of them. “That’s where I lived when I was a kid.”

Rey’s expression changed into one full of wonder and sweetness, while she moved toward the place. 

“It’s weird, isn’t it?” Steve whispered, like talking too loudly could somehow destroy the atmosphere. “It’s been almost eighty years for the world, but not even half for me.”

You miss it?, Rey would have liked to ask, but her voice failed once again and Steve wasn’t Alex, he couldn’t understand her that well. No one could, not there.

Once, in her world, a couple of people had managed.

_Once, yeah_ , she thought touching her braided hair.

Now, all it remained was the dust of memories she wasn’t strong enough to share.

 

_“Brienne,” Alex laughed, eyes full of tears while he ran to hug her. She had her long, blond hair perfectly braided, but a deep, red scar on her cheek - except for that scar, anyway, she looked fine and she was_ there _. Rey hugged her too, shaking in relief._

_“I saw your video,” Brienne smiled. “It was pretty smart, I have to admit.”_

_It had been Alex’ idea, but Rey was the one to actually make it possible; he had wanted to record himself and his sister, to make a point with Ultron and give as much hope as they could to all the civilians who were hiding, followed and hunted by HYDRA. He had also made sure the people they knew, people like Brienne, could easily understand how to find them._

_“So you’re here to stay, right?” Alex asked._

_Brienne nodded. “Where do you think I could go?”_

_She looked around, observing the people hiding in the corners of that “safe house”. “How many?” she inquired._

_“Nineteen including the three of us,” Alex answered sitting on the floor. They were in a warehouse, with no electric power, because in the last few days Ultron had destroyed every source of electricity of the city, and a very poor water system - but still, it was safe. “I think we can stay here for a couple of weeks, before we have to move, which is gold. We’ll have time to find a new place.”_

_“They’re all coming with you?” Brienne asked, giving Rey a caress and starting to bread her hair. “Remember how I taught you?” she smiled after a second, before turning to give Alex her full attention.  
“Yeah. These people are all on Ultron’s list… Most of them recognized us by the video, someone even from before, for… Our parents.”_

_His voice died and he coughed. “They trust us - with their lives. We’re gonna protect them and, with time, I think we can create a team, a… An army, even. And we’ll fight back.”_

_Brienne nodded. “I’ll help you,” she promised, moving to sit beside Rey; the daggers she had attached to her belt, a gift from her uncle Loki, shined for a second. “By the way, how come the video is still circulating? There’s no power in the city, after all!”_

_“I have no idea how Rey did it, honestly,” Alex mumbled. She looked at him, wondering if there was a way to explain herself without speaking - maybe she could find a pen and a piece of paper, somewhere._

_“Oh, for Odin,” Brienne cried out, putting both her hands on her chest and forcing herself to breathe._

_“Brie? You okay?!” Alex moved immediately, holding her. She started sobbing, hands shaking._

_“My father’s gone,” she murmured before she ran outside the warehouse, fast as only a demigod could be. “He’s gone!”_

_A colorful light started shining, creating a column from the sky to Brienne._

_“What the…” Alex whispered, trying to get closer. “Stop it! They’ll find us,_ stop it! _”_

_Brienne looked at him. “_ I’m so- _”_

_And just like that, she disappeared._

_That’s when a metallic sound was heard. “No,” Alex croacked, defeated. He turned toward the sound - and Ultron’s army appeared, flying in the distance._

_“Run!” he yelled to the sixteen people hiding in the warehouse. “RUN!”_

_He took one of them, a human kid who had some gene that one day would have led to a mutant heir, and turned to look for his sister. Her body was covered in the black armor and she had her arms wrapped around a girl of her age.  
They looked at each other, from the opposite sides of the room - and they flew away._

 

_They ignored the screams, the cries._

_They couldn’t defeat Ultron, not alone, not like that._

_In the fight or flight instinct, they chose to live._

 

_Rey tightened the grip on the girl in her arms and looked at the kid Alex was holding._

_At least we saved two of them, she thought while in her mind, where she could be as loud as she wanted, she cried all those deaths._

 

 

“You changed his life,” Steve declared after a while, interrupting her thoughts. “You know that, right?”

Rey turned to look at him and nodded weakly. 

“I mean it. Bruce’s life won’t be the same, thanks to you. I don’t care if it’s not what you wanted, because you. Changed- _improved_. His life.”

He hugged her tightly. “I saw the way you _didn’t_ look at Tony, before. You made Bruce’s life better, do you really think Tony isn’t proud of you?”

_I failed_ , Rey would have like to say. Instead, she held onto Steve and breathed loudly. _I failed them._

“It’s okay, princess,” the man added sweetly.

_Princess_ , she thought. Her father never called her that, but she liked it; it made her feel young again, like a kid, and it didn’t make her feel bad for substituting her pops. 

She had to create new memories, if she wanted to be okay there, in that beautiful, peaceful world.

She just had to.

 


	8. Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8

 

 _“Is it recording?” Alex asked, standing in front of the weird camera Rey had built. She shook her head, fiddling with some metallic pieces and shooting a look to her brother. He was barely standing, so she had to move the frame to avoid showing everyone how weak he was, how his trousers were soaked in blood. How his leg had a long cut that, even with his fast healing process, was taking too long to close - maybe they could try to find a pharmacy to get antibiotics…_ Maybe _, ‘cause in the last few weeks the city and all the cities they’ve traveled across had looked more and more like a post-apocalyptic movie. Pharmacies and supermarkets were almost destroyed, in a way that was just too much, for the time this situation, the Ultron situation, had been going on._

_I guess people took as much as they could out of fear, she thought. Movies and books taught them to take and to stash and to think for themselves._

_“Rey?”_

_She forced a smile and Alex relaxed, getting ready for the video on a psychological level._

_She pressed a button, she ran to her brother’s side and showed him three fingers, then two, one…_

Action _, she thought._

_“Our names are Alexander and Reyna Rogers-Stark. We are Iron Man and Captain America’s kids - we are the Avengers’ heirs.”_

_He spoke looking straight into the camera, the chin up and a controlled expression on his face. He was sure of himself, charismatic just like their parents had been, and he looked strong and brave and tired, yes, he looked tired too, but everyone did, after all._

_The fact that they had to find food and shelter for seven people didn’t really help._

_Alex was still talking and she wasn’t really listening, so she forced herself to do it, not to let the silence she was hiding into push her away from her brother._

_“We’ll give our lives to save you. We will not bend, in front of Ultron. We will not let it take away our lives. We will not let HYDRA win!” Alex shouted, anger and excitement mixing in a powerful alliance. “Wherever you are, we can help you. Find us. Let_ us _find_ you _.”_

_He looked at Rey and smiled, before turning again to face the camera._

_“As long as we’re standing, the hero age will not be over._ The war _will not be over.”_

_Rey smiled as well, thinking “have faith in us”, even though Ultron scared her to death._

_“We’re Alex and Rey,” Alex winked. He thought about his father and how he acted in front of the cameras, so he moved his hand in front of his body, separating two fingers and closing the others in a punch. “_ Peace. _”_

 

“Someone took a picture of you,” Darcy exclaimed opening a web page on the tv screen. 

Steve stilled and turned slowly to look at it. He then breathed loudly in relief. “Her face is covered.”

“Yeah,” Natasha grinned, “by your bicep.”

“Shut up.”

“Everyone thinks you’re a couple, Steve,” Darcy added, eyes glued to her Starkphone. She was trying to read and watch as many tweets and articles and videos as she could, to understand the extent of the damage. “Aaand they all figured out she’s one of the new recruits.”

“They have no proof.”

“They don’t need any, it’s the internet.”

He frowned, looking at Tony, who shrugged and said nothing.

“So… What do we do?” Steve asked. 

Darcy bit her lips. “You could post a tweet saying something like _old memories, new friends_. It could help.”

She waited a second, lost in her thoughts. “Actually, it’s a good plan. We can all create so many expectations, we build it and build it and build it until people will be dying to know more.”

“It will make paparazzi more insistent,” Steve pointed out.

Darcy nodded. “But giving people something will keep them interested and it will gain Alex and Rey the public’s appreciation. They’ll be loved and shipped with everyone and desired… Even before they see their faces!”

She moved her finger on Bucky’s metal arm, in a gesture that was by now familiar. “We could start with your tweet, Steve,” she nodded to herself, “and maybe a picture of Rey’s smile and her blond hair, like… A picture with only the lower part of her face, you know?”  
“It’s too much,” Tony declared, speaking for the first time since they noticed the news on the social medias. 

Darcy stopped and looked at him with the same expression of a doe caught by the lights of a car. “Okay, well… It doesn’t need to be her face. And we could create them two accounts and just let them post things about us, about you Avengers - to let everyone know they’re integrated. Isn’t it a good idea?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Tony murmured after a second. “Of course. You do that.”

He then smiled tightly and left the room; Steve, surprised, found himself moving before even realizing it.

“Tony,” he said following into a conference room, forcing him to stop by taking his arm. They stared at each other, in silence, and Tony distantly wondered when it started: when Steve became the only person on Earth capable of understanding him and calming him down at the same time, with just a look. Not even a word spoken, not even a “what’s wrong?” asked.

_When did you become so important?  
When did I fall in love with you?_

The thought scared him more than he was comfortable in admitting and not just because he was incapable of having good, healthy relationships - not even with Pepper and that woman was a saint! -, not even because the entire world would have accused him of ruining America’s Golden Boy. Not even, Tony thought, because I’ve never really learned how to love and how to be lov- he stopped abruptly, closing the memories of his father in a corner of his mind.

Before - and he meant before the kids, because now they were such an important part of his life that he felt it was divided in _before_ and _after_ them - he thought about Steve and himself.

He hoped.

He never made a move, though, because if things went wrong between them the Avengers would suffer for it - they’d break.

And the Avengers were his family… And also saved people, yeah, there was that too.

But now? Now it was even worse.

If they tried… If they tried being a couple and then everything went to hell, how would the kids react? How would they handle the Avengers fall-out?

“Tony, don’t,” Steve smiled, moving his hands on Tony’s shoulders. “Don’t.”

“You don’t know what I’m stressing over. Maybe I know things you don’t,” he replied, sounding stupid to his own ears.

“Okay,” Steve smiled. He moved and took Tony with him, getting near the window. He stared at New York and started talking, refusing to look at the man by his side. “I’m terrified,” he confessed.

Tony stilled.

“Every time I see them standing there my chest aches and I remember all those horrible things that happened to us. And I want to protect them, but I know I won’t be able to, not from everything.”

Tony nodded, feeling a little better knowing that at least that fear was shared.

“It’s not the only thing I’m scared of, though,” Steve admitted. He turned slightly toward the man of his dreams, but he didn’t meet his eyes.

“Yesterday, when you were talking to Alex… I wanted that so badly… _To be true_. I know I’m not… I know we’re not… But Tony,” he shivered, finally looking at him.

“I’m not-” the billionaire murmured, but stepping forward anyway. “I don’t-”

Steve stilled. “It’s okay,” he said, eyes wide open like he had just been struck by one of Thor’s lightning. “If you don’t feel the same way, I mean. Of course, I mean. I me- _I mean_.”

“Wh-what? No!” Tony yelled, stopping him from walking away like he had just tried to. “I mean that I’m not the person you should want by your side!” he explained in a hurry. “I’m not good enou-”

And then Steve was kissing him.

And it was simply perfect.

 

_Alex woke up and immediately jumped into action, body covered in the armor and gun in his hand. Rey, who had woke him up, put a finger on her mouth and then pointed to the other side of the tunnel. They were hiding in an old, disused subway, with twenty-four other people they found wandering from city to city, from state to state. People they saved, people they had to protect - because, except for a mutant whose screams could shatter glass, they were all powerless civilians. Actually a lot of them had mutant genes, but they hadn’t manifested yet, so…_

_Rey showed Alex two fingers, covered in the armor as well, while she shook awake one of their protegees, who quickly called the others._

_Alex, eyes fixed on his sister, nodded.  
Two. They could have made it._

_Rey shook her head vehemently, looking at the screen of some kind of little computer she had built. She touched once her chest, covered in the nanotech, and then shook her head again. At that point she moved her chin toward the people they were protecting._

_Alex’s heart skipped a beat._

_“Humans?” he mouthed._

_A seven-year-old kid they found hiding in a car sobbed out of fear and another one, older than the first, reacted immediately; she covered his mouth and hugged him tightly, not daring to even whisper a reassurance._

_Alex, so still his muscles hurt, held his breath._

_“I heard something,” a voice said - a human voice._

_“It might be just a rat,” a woman replied with a Spanish accent._

_“No,” the man continued. “I think it was a person.”_

_They could hear their steps, sure and calm, and Alex wondered who, in those terrible times, could be relaxed._

_“You think someone’s hiding here?” the woman asked. The man probably nodded, because she muttered an “okay”._

_Alex stood up and so did Rey, weapons in the hands and feet light, ready to move._

_Brienne’s escape to Asgard had meant the death of almost all they protegees and there was no way, no fucking way that Alex would have let the new ones._

_“I think it came from here,” said the man and his steps got near - too much for their liking._

_“It’s okay,” the woman exclaimed, loud and clear. “Whoever you are, we can help you.”_

_Rey’s eyes ran immediately to her brother and she shook his arm. She recognized that voice, she knew who that person was!_

_Alex looked at her in confusion and Rey showed him her hand, opening it and moving it up and down like she had a… “A yo-yo?” Alex whispered and in a second his eyes were wide in surprise._

_“Yo-Yo?!” he exclaimed loudly, forgetting the fear he had felt just a moment before. Silence followed his words._

_“Is it the Captain’s kid?!” the woman - the SHIELD agent, Alex couldn’t believe their luck - answered._

_In a woosh she and the other man were in front of them and she was hugging them like her life depended on that. “Oh Dios Mios,” she cried, touching first Rey’s and then Alex’s hair in awe. “It is really you!”_

_“And you have company,” the man who had followed her noticed.  
Rey stared at him, trying to remember where she had seen him, while her brother hugged Yo-Yo once more. “Wait,” he thought after a second, “how did you run here so fast?”_

_He stepped back, taking his sister with him and making sure the people they were protecting were safe behind them._

_“Well, you know my powers,” Yo-Yo started saying._

_“I do,” Alex interrupted her, hand slowly going to his gun. “And you always go back to the place you started.”_

_“There’s no need for that,” the stranger man smiled._

_He’s cute, Rey thought, but who could bleach his hair when it was hard to even survive?!_

_“My powers don’t have that limitation,” he explained. “I took her into my arms before running.”_

_“And who would you be?” Alex asked, still cautious._

_“I’m Pietro Maximoff. You probably know me as Quicksilver.”_

_He smiled and winked. “And we’re gonna help you.”_

 

 

 

 

 


	9. Chapter 9

CHAPTER 9

 

Clint snorted loudly, spitting milk and cereals everywhere; Natasha, who was sitting by his side, looked at him in disgust. When she realized the reason for that mess, though, she blinked several times and smirked.

“Oh, I see,” she agreed.

“Right?” he murmured.

Thor, who was eating his poptarts, relaxed as ever, glanced at them in confusion. “What?”

He then noticed that Steve and Tony had entered the room. “Good morning!” he greeted them.

“Hi, Point Break,” Tony answered while the blonde simply smiled. 

“Guys, stop,” he said to Clint and Natasha.

“You look tired, perhaps you didn’t sleep enough?” the archer teased them.

“Did something happen?” Darcy murmured to Sam, who looked at her in surprise.

“You’re right, something… Oh God!” he started laughing. “Did you have sex?”

“That’s what we’re saying,” Natasha exclaimed while Steve turned red and strengthened his grip on the glass of juice he was holding. Tony, without even thinking about it, took the glass and put it on the table.

“Guys!” he blurted. “It-”

“They totally had sex!” Darcy yelled, laughing in an almost maniacal way. 

Bruce and Bucky chose that moment to come into the room, followed by Alex and Rey. Both the kids and Bucky were dressed in the training clothes, while Bruce had some papers in his hands, papers filled with data.

“Oh,” Alex murmured, frowning. “I didn’t need to know that.”

Bucky laughed loudly and gave him a pat on the back; Steve, now purple, hid the head in his hands. 

“I can’t believe it,” he mumbled. 

Tony, more used than him to the unwanted attention, smiled his best press-smile. “Aren’t you glad, kiddo? We’re together now! And sex is a part of the relationship!”

Rey, at least, was smiling.

“TMI, dad, TMI!” Alex blurted, covering his ears, and he didn’t even notice the way he had called him.

“Yeah well, would you prefer: when are you going to bring a nice girl home?”

Alex froze and his eyes widened, before he shook his head. “No, thanks.”

Rey, hugging him with one arm, giggled.

“Why, you think you’re safe?” Tony grinned. “Do you even realize how bad it will be when your boyfriend will have to meet us? Knowing you’re Captain America’s and Iron Man’s kid?”

“Or better,” Bucky, “the Winter Soldier's and the Black Widow's niece.”

Rey simply smiled, shrugging.

It meant having a family, after all.

 

_“Seventy?” Alex asked, eyes wandering all over the place. It was an underground hangar that once belonged to the X-Men - on the walls, in fact, there was their logo, slightly ruined but still recognizable._

_“For now, yeah. Seventy survivors, of whom almost fifty are younger than twenty-five,” Pietro answered, smiling at Alex with a proud expression._

_“And now twenty-four more,” he added thinking about the people they brought there._

_“Yeah. A good number, don’t you think?”_

_They looked around in silence, after that, admiring the way people seemed to cooperate; the place had almost a hundred single beds, like military facilities, one near the other._

_Zero privacy, Alex thought, but at least they’re safe._

_“I’ll show you the rest,” Pietro proposed._

_They walked to a smaller room, where different pipelines had little holes to create showers, and another one with the toilets. On a wall there were written the turns, divided for age and gender._

_A wet hand touched his shoulder and Alex caught it, muscles ready to fight; he immediately calmed down seeing it was Rey, with Yo-Yo… And Ezra._

_Ezra was an eleven-year-old boy who had been chased by Ultron from the second it was created. They had protected him in every way they could, from the moment they found him and he had a specific order: always be in either Alex or Rey’s sight. He was too important._

_“Hey, I’m Pietro,” he introduced himself._

_“I’m Ezra,” he replied, eyes open wide. “Are you… Are you Magneto’s son?”_

_Quicksilver stilled, before forcing a smile and nodding. “If he did-”_

_“No, I’m asking because…”_

_“Not here,” Alex stopped him; Rey took his arm and together they looked at Pietro. “Is there a place we can talk?”_

_“Of course,” he shot them a curious look. “But not now. Now I have to go on a mission. One of us had a vision about some survivors who are living in an old train station and we want to check.”_

_“You sure it’s not a trap?” Alex murmured._

_“No,” Pietro answered, shoulders tensed but a determined look on his face. Both the Rogers-Stark kids knew that feeling, when you know that going out could mean never coming back, and at the same time realizing you cannot stay put._

_“I’m coming with you,” Alex said before even thinking about it. Rey, by his side, bit her lips and touched his arm, not to beg him not to go, but to say “I understand. Be careful”._

_“I will,” Alex replied, even though he could only imagine what his sister was trying to tell him._

_“You sure?” Pietro asked once, already stretching._

_The nanotech covered Alex body. “I’m sure.”_

 

They were resting on the couch when it happened. It was late and the kids were tired, because that morning Bucky had trained with them just like old times - except it wasn’t, it wasn’t at all, because their uncle had died and this one was a different person… And almost exactly like the other one, too -, while Bruce took notes. His interest was both scientific and personal, truth to be told, for the simple fact that Alex and Rey had got under his skin too, somehow, while he wasn’t looking, while he wasn’t paying attention.

Or maybe he had let them, knowing they’re the closest thing he’ll ever have to children of his own.

After the morning training session, however, he had insisted on collecting some other data, and this time Natasha had stepped up, under Tony slightly worried eyes. He knew she would have never really hurt them, but somehow seeing them end up on the mattress time after time still bothered him.

In the end they had fought so much and so hard that their muscles were aching, even with the enhanced healing process; that’s why they were on the couch, almost hidden between the pillows.

In their favor, Natasha was kind of tired too - in a good way.

That’s when it happened. 

An alarm went off, making all the Avengers jump into action. 

“What’s wrong, Friday?!” Tony asked.

“Emergency call from Spider-man, sir.”

Everyone stilled.

“ _He’s got Gwen!_ ” his voice was shouted, high in panic, and the sound of the city almost disappeared under his fear. “The Green Goblin has Gwen!”

“Where are you, son?!” Steve asked, already dressed as Captain America - Alex shot him a look but said nothing, because jealousy was the stupidest thing he could be feeling at the moment. Also, he probably used the word “son” with everyone who was younger than him.

Spider-man gave his location and Iron Man, Captain America and Thor ran there; they considered that the Avengers all weren’t needed and so they sent only the ones capable of flying. Steve, who hugged Tony during the flight, went mostly as a figure - you wouldn’t guess how many people gave up under Captain America’s “ _I’m disappointed_ ” glare.

Rey, still on the couch, opened the news. 

“Why no one is talking about it?” Alex expressed his sister’s doubt.

Clint breathed in and out slowly. “New York’s divided. Half thinks of Spidey as the hero we know he is, the other half sees him as a criminal vigilante.”

“Wasn’t he an Avenger, in your world?” Darcy asked, before sitting near Bucky. 

Alex shook his head. “He died when we were kids. I don’t even remember his face, if I’m honest.”

That brought silence into the room. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said it like that,” he apologized when Rey slapped lightly his knee.

“And this… Gwen?” he murmured after a second. “His girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” Bruce nodded. “A good kid, came to the Tower a couple of times… So smart.”

Then they fell into the silence, everyone deep in their own thoughts.

 

_“I’m going to be your best friend,” a girl smiled, sitting down on the bench Rey was already on. She looked at the girl and noticed silently that she was blind… Maybe that’s why she had said that._

_Everyone else seemed to realize quickly she wasn’t really… Chatty._

_“It’s okay,” the girl added. “You don’t need to talk, with me.”_

What? _, Rey thought._

_“I’m Blindfold,” she answered. “I can read minds - and I’m going to be your best friend, Hush.”_

Hush? _, Rey replied in her head. It felt weird, but somehow she was communicating, she was talking!_

_“It’s the name you’re known as,” Blindfold laughed._

Really?

_“Yeah! And I think it’s so cool!”_

_Rey laughed as well, looking at the girl._

_A friend._

_She could live with that._

_“Thank you,” Blindfold grinned. “Anyway your brother’s safe. He and Pietro are going to spend the night at the train station and tomorrow they’ll bring here the survivors they found.”_

_Rey’s eyes went to Ezra’s sleeping body, before she hid the head in her hands._ Alex reached out?

_“No, I had a vision.”_

What.

_“I’m not just a telepath,” Blindfold forced a smile. “And let me tell you, sometimes it’s more a burden than a gift.”_

_She breathed loudly. “But at least I saved people.”_

Then maybe it’s worth it, don’t you think?, _Rey thought as clearly as she could._

 _“You’re right,” Blindfold nodded. “It’s worth it,_ Hush _. It’s always worth it, if we can save someone.”_

_She smiled sadly toward the ground. “Even though it’s not everybody.”_

 

They came back long after midnight, in the Quinjet Natasha flew there because “Spider-man can’t swing right now and… Just come, please, Nat”.

“I know that voice,” Bucky had murmured after the call, burying his face in Darcy’s hair. “It’s Stevie’s grieving voice.”

“No,” she cried just as low.

Alex stood up and started pacing, while Rey hugged a pillow and rested her head on the couch, watching him going back and forth. 

Finally, they arrived.

Everyone stood up to welcome them; Thor was the first, face fixed on the ground. Then came Natasha, who met Clint’s eyes and shook slowly her head. 

Darcy retreated into another room at that point, shrugging off Bucky’s hand from her shoulder, because she didn’t want her sobs to upset Peter more than he already was. She met Gwen just a few times, they weren’t really friends… And yet she felt such a sadness in her heart that made her wonder how people went on, when bad things happened all the time.

Bucky followed, but not before looking at Steve. He had a hand on Peter’s back, while Tony one on his shoulder, on the other side.

Peter… Peter had Gwen’s body in his arms.

And he refused to let go.

 

_“So, why was that kid asking about my father?” Pietro asked him lighting a cigarette._

_“Ezra admires him. I know,” Alex added quickly, smirking, “it’s probably the first time you hear that.”_

_“Fuck off!” Pietro laughed, pushing him; Alex lost the balance and almost fell to the ground, managing not to just because of the other boy, who caught his arm and laughed again. “Not everyone can be the most loved heroes’ kid.”_

_“Yeah,” he mumbled and for a few seconds they remained in silence, looking at the cigarette’s smoke getting lost in the wind. They were on watch, to protect the three starving people they found in the train station, but the place was more or less safe and they really didn’t need a lot of attention._

_“My twin sister is dead,” Pietro murmured after a moment, eyes fixed on the stars._

_Alex looked at him, saying nothing._

_“She could have stopped all this, you know? She had the power and she was ready to, but right when she was doing the necessary magic… One of those robots ripped her heart from her chest. Just like that.”_

_He had the eyes full of tears when he met Alex’s._

_“No more Ultron. That’s what she was trying to say. That’s what it would have taken. Only three words.”_

_Alex stepped forward and touched his shoulder, and Pietro leaned into the caress, cigarette thrown on the ground._

_“Take care of yours, that’s what I’m saying. Your twin is half of you. You don’t want to live without her, trust me.”_

_Alex nodded solemnly and Pietro looked at him. They hugged without a word._

_Maybe it’s a survivor thing; friends are made in a day, because in a day you might not be there anymore, so you hold on what makes you feel at least a little bit more alive, and maybe a little less lonely too._

_They hugged for a long time, and they stared at each other even more, foreheads one against the other._

_They hugged and breathed the same air, and smiled under the stars._

_And then they kissed, because what else could have they done?_

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a thing I did -> [Click here](https://deasn.tumblr.com/post/173608297488/for-my-story-on-ao3-it-will-last-check-it-out).


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry I'm late and that this chapter is shorter than usual, but college has been crazy. I don't think I'm gonna be able to post a new chapter, but from June on i should be more like usual.

CHAPTER 10

 

Saying that Peter was destroyed was a euphemism.

He spent the first week closed in the bedroom Tony has labeled as _his_ , in the Avengers Tower, and for the first due days he refused to eat and drink. At that point Steve had decided to step in, telling him that it was okay, if he wanted to grieve alone, but starving himself was not the answer. 

After that, at least Peter ate and drank - while still refusing to leave his bedroom, except to go to the bathroom.

“I don’t know what to do,” Tony grunted in frustration one day. “He doesn’t want to talk, or take some fresh air, or… Anything!”

“He’s in pain, Tony,” Natasha murmured from the wall she was leaning on. “It’s not that easy.”  
“I know, but that kid needs… I just…” 

He didn’t have an answer, so he closed his mouth and turned around; Alex, in the kitchen, was watching him with a serious expression, still wearing the training clothes from his earlier sparring session with Bucky.

“What?” Tony asked him when he didn’t say a word. 

“Nothing,” Alex replied. He took a sip of his glass of water and left the room, without even glancing back.

“Now what’s his problem?” he blurted at no one in particular.

“I’ll talk to him,” Clint said and followed him, ignoring Tony’s surprised look; he was sure the man liked his kids, but he never saw him actually spend time with them if others weren’t in the room, so… It was weird seeing him this interested.

“Okay, that’s it,” Tony exclaimed. “I’m gonna drag Pete out of that room.”  
“No,” Natasha stopped him. “That’s not the way and you know it.”

“Then wha-”

“Let’s give him time, Tony.”

She shook slowly her head, looking for a second as lost as he was. “Let him ask, don’t force him. Let him grieve.”

He mumbled something and nodded, defeated. “I wish I could take away his pain… I’d rather feel it myself.”

“You speak like a real father,” Natasha smiled then and patted him on a shoulder.

“Peter’s not my kid.”

“Does it matter?” she smirked. “Also, your real kid is in his room, right now, so just let things happen.”

Tony’s eyes went wide. “Alex?”

She smiled and simply shook her head.

 

In the mean time, Alex had gone back to the gym, where he was pushing himself to the limit - and he had the Supersoldier Serum in his veins!

“Are you gonna just stare at me?” he asked loudly at one point, because he had noticed Clint getting into the room five minutes before and he had yet said anything.

“Peter’s a great kid, you know?”

“I’m sure he is,” Alex nodded, hitting the punching bag so hard it collapsed. “Fuck.”

“Your father destroys at least one of those per day, so no problem,” Clint smirked and moved forward.

“He’s not-” Alex exclaimed, stopping himself before completing the sentence. He felt like a monster: he was fed with nothing but love by the Avengers and in return he vomited hate.

“I know,” the archer nodded. “He’s not your real father and it feels weird, I bet. But somehow you care about them just like you would with your parents.”

“You have every answer in the world, uh?” Alex snorted.

Clint grinned. “I know you’re jealous.”

“Shut up.”

“And I know it’s okay,” he continued, causing Alex to turn not to meet his eyes. “I mean it,” Clint insisted. “It’s boring it’s so normal.”

“Stop it.”

“No.”

They stared at each other, silently, in one of those moments when no one wants to back down, to admit defeat, and Alex distantly wondered when _this_ Clint had started caring. He was sure he liked them, but to the point of talking to him like his other-universe-version - his _uncle_ \- would have? No.

… Or maybe yes?

“It’s okay,” Clint repeated. “No one is going to take them away from you. No one and nothing.”

Without meaning to, Alex’s eyes filled with tears. “I-I don’t… I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I know. And _it’s okay._ ”

They said nothing else, before hugging. Clint kept him in his arms who knows how long, rubbing his spine in what he hoped was a comforting gesture; Alex didn’t cry, but he strengthened his grip and felt like a part of him was dying.

He just hoped that meant something else was borning.

 

“Who are you?” Peter asked and immediately coughed, voice broken by disuse and muffled by the blankets. He was on the bed, his eyes the only visible part of his body.

Rey, who had just got into the room, sat on the floor near him and didn’t answer.

“Friday, who’s she?”

“She’s Reyna Rogers-Stark, called Rey. She’s Master Stark’s and Captain Rogers’ daughter from another universe; on the gym floor there’s her twin brother, Alexander Rogers-Stark.”

A moment of silence followed and then… “Wait, what?!”

Rey laughed quietly while Peter stared at her in disbelief. 

“You serious?!”

She nodded, glad that she got him to talk and to look more alive than he did in the last few days. She had seen people in that situation, both strangers and people she cared about, and it always hurt her not to be able to help them. Ultron had made her feel useless in ways she had never thought she’d experience, but now those horrors gave her the chance to act, to know what to do.

“Did you knew me, in your world?” Peter asked after a second of silence. 

She shook her head.

“You don’t talk much, do you?”

She did it again.

“Thank you,” Peter added quietly. “I don’t want to talk about what happened.”

His eyes filled with tears and he coughed, before grasping the pillow as hard as he could, but Rey pretended not to notice and took his hand in hers. They stayed there for a while, just breathing and living, even if it hurt. Even when the memories got so bad they made him sob without control. Even when she climbed on the bed and hugged him - they didn’t know each other, but pain is pain, he needed a friend and she was pretty much her age, so he didn’t complain.

They stayed there for a while, yeah, and when the room became too small and Peter became claustrophobic they decided to go get some air. 

“I don’t really want to see them,” Peter murmured before he reached the door. “They’ll want to talk or… They’ll look at me in that way, pitying me…”

Rey knew that feeling so well she felt the nausea rise without her consent; she immediately pointed to the window.

“I don’t know where my costume is,” Peter answered, eyes following her finger.

She let the nanotech cover her body - Spiderman gasped - and took his hand, while he sputtered meaningless words of surprise. Rey laughed loudly at that and opened the window.

She flew to the roof, arms around Peter’s chest, and they used a metallic tube like a bench, where they sat. She listened to his exclamations and answered his theories in the best way she could, even though still non-verbally, and that distraction was welcomed; not to say he forgot about what happened, or he stopped caring! It’s just that, sometimes, when something bad happens, it’s okay not to think about it. It’s okay to protect yourself by getting distracted - it doesn’t fix anything and it doesn’t help in the long run, but if done for a short period of time it’s okay. It’s not intoxicating.

Rey knew it.  
It just helps you breathe.

 

_“Don’t look at me like that,” Alex begged turning his face not to meet his sister’s smirk. He blushed and hated himself for it, but in the end he just looked at her and hugged her._

_“I… I know it will never last and we’ll all die and…”_

_She covered his mouth with two fingers and he gave out a wet laugh. “He really makes me happy, Rey-Rey,” he murmured so low he wasn’t sure she could hear it._

_Of course, she did._

_Rey stroked his cheek and let him hide into her neck, touching him like a mother would. She moved her hand into his hair until she felt he was falling asleep and then she kept moving, trying to keep him relaxed enough to sleep soundly and without nightmares. She sat there, hugging him and just loving him for hours, watching the ceiling of the hangar like it was the sky. Like she could really see the stars and the people she had lost._

_I’ll take care of him, she told them silently, just the way he does with me. I promise._

_She saw Blindfold turn around in her bed and she heard her say something like “think less loudly”, but they were fine, they were safe, and her brother was in her arms, so she didn’t answer and just closed her eyes._

_It was okay._

 

“Can I join you?” Alex asked, even though he was already walking towards them.  
Rey smiled and waved; Peter moved uncomfortably, but let him sit by his side without complaining.

“I guess you’re Alex,” the oldest murmured after a minute. The air was warm and the sun was going down, creating a beautiful red and orange light, and yet Peter found himself shivering. He crossed his arms and soon felt Rey move to rest her head on his shoulder.

Something of him must have told her she could trust him, because she was totally relaxed even if they actually just met.

“Yeah,” Alex nodded. He took out a pack of cigarettes and played with it, passing it from one hand to the other. 

“You smoke?” Peter asked without thinking about it, surprised that Steve’s kid could have such a vice.

“No,” Alex replied, watching the pack with an odd expression. “I heard what happened,” he continued.

Peter stiffed and turned to look at the sunset.

“It sucks.”

Rey nodded at her brother’s words and Peter looked first at one and then the other, before giving up the pretense of being okay and lowering his head. “It does,” he murmured. He was expecting an “I’m sorry”, but it never came.

“I’ve been in your position, you know?” Alex muttered after a couple of seconds, voice strained by pain and eyes fixed on the sky. He moved the pack of cigarettes and slowly pressed it to his lips, in an intimate gesture that Peter felt intrusive in watching. Rey kept looking at them, silent as always.

“I’m not talking about losing our family,” Alex specified. “I’m talking abou-about falling in love,” he coughed in discomfort, “just to lose them.”

Peter said nothing and kept staring to the sunset, to the city he vowed to protect.

They all stayed there and they did it in silence, because sometimes words are simply too heavy and their absence can help more than their presence.

So they stayed there and they shared the roof and they held hands.

And Peter, somehow, felt that breathing was a little bit easier.

 


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

 

_“Did your father ever show you his powers?” Ezra asked barely loud enough for Pietro to hear; he turned to look at the kid and frowned._

_“Yeah.”_

_His eyes met Rey’s, who stopped sewing a man’s forehead the second she saw Ezra talking to him. She turned to look for Alex; when he noticed her distress, he tried to find - and immediately did - the cause._

_“Did he do some, like, exercises or…” the kid continued and Pietro frowned even more._

_“Are you a fanboy or something?!” he exclaimed surprised. His father had been a criminal for years, even though he had cared for him as deeply as he would have had with a cop for a dad. A criminal, yeah, and an activist and the kind of mutant who could have stopped the war against Ultron in a second._

_HYDRA had found him first, though, back when Ultron was still in its control. They had started using non-metal bullets and so they simply shot one in his father’s head. Just like that._

_Wanda had screamed and turned those people into dust without even noticing._

_“Ezra, not here,” Alex’s voice came loud and clear from behind his back; he quickly walked to them and took the kid by one arm, pulling him with him into a room they used for stocking._

_Pietro followed suit._

_“What’s the matter?” he asked closing the door after him._

_“One second,” Alex murmured while he checked they were alone. “Okay.”_

_“I’m sorry, it’s just that… He was…” Ezra began saying, but he was immediately interrupted._

_“I know,” Alex smiled, forcing himself to remember that this was just a kid, without his parents, in a world so hostile it made you wonder if it was worth it. “And it’s okay.”_

_“Don’t tell me he’s my step-brother or something,” Pietro muttered, looking at him like he was a ghost._

_“No,” Alex denied, “but he’s the most important person in here and probably in the world, right now.”_

_“And this w-” Pietro started, before his eyes widened and his breath got caught in his throat. “All those questions, your interest for his powers…”_

_He kneeled to look at him in the eyes. “You can control metal, can’t you?”_

_Ezra bit his lips and looked briefly at Alex, before turning his attention back to Pietro._

_He nodded._

 

Peter had started talking again, getting out of his room often and for more than just a couple of minutes. He wandered to the labs, watching with interest Jane, Bruce, Tony and Rey work, even though except for the last two they all had different disciplines. One day, less than three months after, two other scientists, two SHIELD agents, came too and worked with them - Simmons with Bruce and Fitz with Tony and Rey.

For a second Peter felt weird, noticing how easily Fitz seemed to understand Rey and her silence, but when he saw the way he looked at Simmons he felt immediately relaxed.

This made him jump and get out of the lab as fast as he could, because not even three months had passed since Gwen’s… Since Gwen, and the idea of feeling anything _ever_ made him sick. He was done.

Love had failed, with him, and he didn’t really want to try again.

Not that he thought Rey actually wanted it - wanted him -, of course.

Of course.

“You don’t need to run away from her, you know,” Alex grinned one day, cornering Peter. “Rey won’t say a word if you don’t make a move first.”

He realized what he said and groaned. “No pun intended.”

“It’s not-” Peter argued weakly, “I don’t-”

“When I had the chance to be with someone I liked, I did it. And yeah, the end was…” Alex hesitated. “The end was painful. But it was worth it.”

Peter stood there, eyes wide open. “But I-”

Steve chose that moment to walk into the room and his words faded immediately. Not only he wasn’t ready to talk about that - it was too soon, to saddle, and Gwen’s memories still burned in his heart and his mind -, but surely he wasn’t ready to talk about it with _her father_!

“What are you two whispering about it?” Steve asked curiously.

“Nothing!” they both answered at the same time.

“That wasn’t suspicious at all,” Tony laughed getting into the room.

The two of them were incredibly more relaxed and, Alex noticed with a big smile, happier. It was different from the way his parents had looked at each other for his entire life, because you could sense in the air the fact that it was all new, all amazing. The classic honeymoon phase.

“We’ll talk about it in another moment,” Alex murmured walking behind Peter, who paled. 

“There’s no need, I assure you!”

He laughed, ignoring him.

“Does someone want to spar?” he asked loudly. “Not Bucky,” he added quickly when he saw him coming into the room.

“Why not, kid? Scared?” he grinned.

The truth was that the day before the Soldier had destroyed him, but there was no need for the others to know. 

Also, Alex was just like his fathers… He couldn’t back down from a challenge.

“Fuck me,” he muttered, getting a disapproving look from Steve as an answer. “It’s on, old man.”

Bucky laughed. “You bet, Bedtime Story.”

“It’s _Legend_!”

“Sure, Folk Story.”

“You know what, Grandpa…” and his voice got lost, as he walked away with Bucky.  
“I think it’s good for him,” Steve mumbled after a second, ignoring Peter, who silently retreated to one of the labs.

“For Alex? Yeah, I-”

“No,” Steve interrupted Tony, “I was talking about Bucky. I think the kids are good for him.”

Tony smiled sweetly and stole him a kiss. “The kids are good for all of us.”

 

_Pietro laughed quietly, before taking a deep breath. “Not bad,_ Legend _.”_

_Alex shot him a look of fake disapproval; it was obvious he wasn’t mad, but actually really happy. “Don’t call me that.”_

_“It’s a nice superhero name!”  
“It really isn’t.”_

_Pietro rolled on the ground to face him and smirked. “I think it’s hot.”_

_“You think everything about me is hot, admit it,” Alex replied pinching his bare stomach._

_“Mh… I’m guilty, your honor.”_

_He moved forward and kissed him, smiling on his lips in the sweetest scene ever. Alex still couldn’t understand how it was possible to be that lucky; to meet someone who gets into your heart in a day, with no question, no doubt. Someone who knows you, accepts you and always has your back._

_He wondered for a second if that was what his parents had._

_If this was the kind of feeling you would die to protect._

_He stared at Pietro._

_Do I love you?, he thought._

_They kissed again and Pietro, slowly because he knew that being unable to see him made Alex feel weird, crawled and sat on him, closing him into his arms._

_“How can you be ready for another round so fast,” Pietro laughed quietly._

_“Supersoldier serum,” the other answered, breath shorter every second._

_They kissed once more, just because it was never enough, and Alex thought again and again about the question he asked himself._

_Do I love him?_

_He felt his eyes fill with tears._

_I do._

_But it wasn’t the right moment, the right situation._  
I just need patience, he thought. Time.  
And, for once, the future looked a little bit brighter.

 

_“I found another place we could hide, in case something here went wrong,” Alex murmured hours later. “I told only Rey. Maybe I could brief everyone else later.”  
Pietro became serious in a second. “Actually, let’s keep it to ourselves.”_

_“Why? If everyone knows, even if we spread they’ll be able to find us! It’s a good plan.”_

_“No, Alex,” he answered, face dark._

_“What are you not telling me?”_

_“Alex-”_

_“Talk to me, Pietro.”_

_Pietro took a deep breath. “I think we have a mole.”_

 

“You know, you never told us where you were staying, in the other universe,” Jane wondered before taking a huge bite of spaghetti.

Darcy, who was snapping a picture of the Avengers reunited for lunch - from behind Alex and Rey, so that their hair was the only part of them visible -, shot her a look and laughed. “The future queen of Asgard, everyone!”

Thor laughed loudly at that and looked at his girlfriend, who was focused on the kids, ignoring her best friend.

“Filter, hashtag and… Posted!” Darcy smiled. “People are going crazy, you know? They’re dying to know who Legend and Hush really are.”

“One day they’ll find out,” Steve murmured.

“No, one day we’ll tell them,” Tony replied. “We’ll be in control of it the entire time.”

Rey forced herself to smile and so did Alex, trying to look happy even though Jane’s question had sent them in a black hole of feelings.

“Where’s Peter?” Natasha interrupted them - she actually didn’t want the attention to go back to the kids’ old world, because she had noticed their expression and, honestly, they were having such a nice day. There was no need for sadness.

Rey shrugged, focusing on the spaghetti in her plate and refusing to look up.

“He went home, his aunt was worried,” Tony replied. He looked at his daughter - he wanted to try something. “He’ll be back tomorrow.”

Just as predicted, Rey relaxed and started smiling again.

_I see_ , he thought.

Jane sat there in silence for a few seconds, before shrugging. “No one answered my question.”

Alex coughed. “Mh, well… There was a… Like a cave, with a water-carved tunnel that led to a… Like a system of different caves. It was… Big a-and it had a subterranean river. So, you know…” he kept stopping to breathe and to find the right words, immediately pale and sweating. 

Steve, sensing like everyone else that something was wrong, interrupted him. “It’s alright, son. It’s alright.”

He got up and hugged him, dismissing the others until only him, Alex, Tony and Rey remained in the room. The more the kid - and his breath - got stressed, the worse Rey looked, to the point that she started crying, holding onto Tony.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” he murmured, but he was actually starting to freak out as well. He shot Steve a look, but he was too focused on the kids to notice.

“It’s alright,” he kept repeating. “Everything is fine.”

 

“Dad, Pops?” Alex called them, a while after calming down. They were laying on Tony’s - and now Steve’s - bed, both of them hugging the kids, who were in the middle; Alex was almost as big as Steve, so it wasn’t actually the most comfortable position ever, but it did the job.

“Yeah?” Tony answered quietly, because there are moments when even just being loud can destroy everything.

“I never told you this, back… Back home,” he said and it hurt, that he still thought of the other universe like home, but at the same time it was right. This wasn’t his world, his family, his life - _except that now it is_ , he told himself, closing his eyes because sometimes talking is way easier if you don’t meet other people’s eyes. It would have also been easier if it had been dark, yeah, except that waiting hours to have this conversation was too much.

Even though he had waited years - now that he wanted to talk, the words were filling his stomach, his lungs, his throat, every single inch of him.

“I should have told you,” he continued. “It’s just that… Our lives were always controlled and spied by the world, each move judged, every word weighted. It was hard.”

“It’s okay, Alex. Everything is fine,” Steve murmured, looking at Tony because he had already understood the topic; meeting his eyes, he realized he wasn’t the only one.

“I’m bisexual.”

He blurted it and immediately breathed loudly, shock and happiness and fear and pride running through his veins. He knew, of course, that no one in the Avengers would have ever judged him, but still - it was something he had never said out loud, nor told anyone who wasn’t his sister.

Tony smiled and hugged him and so did Steve - Rey, kind of crushed in the middle, smiled as well and enjoyed that moment. 

Alex laughed quietly.

“I was even in love, in the other world,” he exclaimed. “In love, you understand? And I miss him!” his voice got higher than normal and he laughed again. “I miss him like crazy!”

He coughed and sobbed and then laughed once more, in a mix of histeria and pain that made Tony sit quickly and make him sit as well. “Breathe, Alex.”

“I loved him and I’ll never see him again. I didn’t do shit, for him, you know?!”  
And now Rey was crying again, quietly, hugging a pillow because her “parents” were too focused on her brother. “I’m sorry,” she murmured, which made both Steve and Tony turn to look at her in shock.

“I let him die!”

“I’m so sorry, Alex!” she repeated, before jumping on him to hug him, pillow forgotten.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he sobbed.  
“I should have seen it!”

“I miss him,” he replied, crying just as hard as she was.

Tony and Steve, sitting near, looked at each other in silence. _They’re dealing with it on their own_ , the soldier tried to make him understand, even though it was all said with facial expressions.

_Then what do we do?_ , Tony’s answer seemed to be.

_We just stay here._

_We… We just stay here?_

_Yeah. So that they know that we’ll be here, if they need us._

Tony smiled. _You’re right. We’ll be here._

He shot the kids a look and felt his chest fill with warmth. _This kind of love lasts forever._

 


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think next chapter will be the last one.  
> Enjoy this one, for now, and sorry I'm late!

CHAPTER 12

 

“Iron Man, Thor, Legend and Hush are the first to get on the scene!” the woman yelled into the microphone, trying to look untouched by the fight behind her back: six supervillains had escaped a SHIELD facility and were creating havoc in New York.

“And now the Avengers Quinjet is here as well,” she continued, alternating the pose in front of the camera to the moments when she gave it her back, to watch the scene. It was scary, with fragments of buildings and cars being thrown around, even though the Avengers were doing their best to contain the “problem”.

“The supervillains-”

Alex shut her out completely, focused on his task and his sister - it was impossible, for him, to ignore Rey, after a life spent taking care of her. He jumped from a building and let himself fall for a couple of seconds, before flying fast to the side of one of those criminals; they were called the Sinister Six and, honestly, he could see the reason. 

Thor was handling a guy who was electric and Alex landed there, immediately kicking the man and distracting him, so that the God of Thunder could hit him with full strength.

Oh, it felt good, being there. Fighting with the Avengers, just like he had hoped and wanted so badly for years.

It almost made him puke, the thought that he actually had to lose everyone to gain that privilege.

He threw a punch, shooting a look to Rey, to check on her - just in case.

She was in front of a man at least three times bigger than her, but there were Bucky and their fath- _Iron Man_ , Iron Man!, by her side, so Alex wasn’t really worried. That’s until that man, that criminal, turned his entire body into sand and swallowed Rey, suffocating her scream.

“No!” he yelled, so loudly his own ears ringed.

It was, at that point, at least fifty percent his fault, if Electro was capable of using his distraction. Well, Thor’s too, but he had noticed a jet approaching and had looked at it, turning his back to the situation, for only a second - the exact time it took Alex to see Rey vanish under the sand.

_She can’t breathe!_ , he thought, heart beating so fast it almost escaped his chest.

He didn’t even _see_ Electro, and that was his mistake.

Electro smiled.

 

_“Who do you think it is?” Alex asked quietly, walking just a step after Pietro, who shook his head while letting his eyes wander for the room._

_“I just know someone had contacted Ultron from our former base… And that our last two missions ended up in a slaughter. You need to warn your sister, by the way.”_

_Alex looked for Rey in the survivors’ faces, frowning when he couldn’t find her. “I need to-” he murmured, stopping his boyfriend - he still couldn’t believe he was so lucky! - by an arm._

_A loud noise interrupted him._

_Pietro immediately looked at him, eyes wide open and lips mouthing something that seemed painfully similar to “I love you”… But no, it couldn’t be that, because it would have meant things were going to shit and he was happy! For once he was genuinely happy! He deserved it. He… He couldn’t. He never said he loved him. Pietro never heard those words, from him, from anyone, he needed to…_

_He grasped his hand._

_The roof of the facility crumbled and revealed a hundred Ultron’s sentinels._

_Pietro smiled sadly. He touched his face, his lips, one last time. And then he disappeared._

 

_People were screaming._

_That’s what made Rey jump into action from the stocking room she was sitting in. Ezra, who had been training his powers by her side for the last hour, imitated her, shivering in fear._

_Rey moved so that he was hidden behind her and walked to the door, opening it and leaving it ajar._

_People were screaming and running, kids in their parents or guardians’ arms or even alone, trying to be as fast as they could. Teleporters were desperately disappearing and reappearing every couple of seconds, taking as many people as they managed._

_Trying to breathe calmly, Rey took Ezra in her arms, already covered in the armor, and silently got out of the room. Where was Alex?!_

_She looked up and saw that the roof was gone, broken into pieces, and the most powerful - and brave - mutants and inhumans were trying to hold Ultron and his army back, to buy the others time._

_Rey ran to the first teleporter she saw and gave him a photograph of the new safe place they wanted to go to. One of the sentinels almost managed to shoot her, but she got to the man - was his name Kurt? Well, it was easy to recognize anyway, he was blue! - and let him Ezra._

_“No!” Ezra yelled and cried, but Rey forced him to let her go and turned before she could see him disappear._

_Alex was her priority, now._

_All around her, though, there was chaos._

_She turned and turned again, trying to find her brother. That’s when she saw Pietro, just in time to watch him getting immobilized by one of the sentinels - he’d have a fate worse than death, she knew it. His powers were too interesting to just let him die. He would have become a lab rat, tortured and experimented on, and his powers would have soon made Ultron even stronger than it already was._

_He must have had the same thought, because he looked in front of him, both pain and determination in his wet eyes._

_Rey followed them and saw Alex standing there, face red, hair everywhere and cheeks covered in tears._ Oh God, Alex _, was her only thought._

_He had a gun in his hands._

 

_Alex had always been good, in this kind of things. Bucky and Natasha had taught them how to handle weapons when they were just kids, after all._

_He had always been good. The “one shot, one death” kind of guy._

 

_So he shot._

 

_Pietro fell to the ground._

_His eyes were still filled with tears._

 

_Alex fell to his knees, heads in his hands, gun forgotten._

_He never told him he loved him._

 

Alex felt a knot forming in his stomach and grunted, feeling like a football player who gets tackled to the ground, only a thousand times faster.

He opened his eyes - he hadn’t even noticed he closed them - and saw blue painfully familiar eyes.

_I’m dead_ , he thought.

“You okay, _Legend_?” the man smirked. “Nice name, by the way. I think it’s hot!”  
He winked and Alex realized they were in an alley, not too far away from the fight; the same fight that was now forgotten, closed in a corner of his mind. Even his own sister disappeared for a second… Because he was staring into those eyes. 

“Pietro,” he breathed and immediately wanted to cry, to scream, to kiss him and punch him at the same time.

Instead, he jumped back, putting distance between them, and took a deep breath.

He then fell to his knees and threw up.

 

_“What did I do,” Alex cried, hugging Rey like his life depended on it. She moved, holding him with an arm, and managed to reach the bloc notes on the edge of the bed._

_“You helped him in the best way you could,” she wrote quickly, words stuck in her throat. She didn’t know how to make him feel better and, if she could be honest, they really didn’t have the time. If they really had a mole, they needed to find them!_

_… But he needed time and so he’d have it._

 

_There had been a hundred nineteen people in the former X-Men’s facility._

_Only thirty-seven of them survived. Nor Pietro or Yo-Yo did._

_It took Alex just a day, to realize he couldn’t let the pain cost his and the survivors’ lives; he immediately closed every kind of love-related thought in a corner of his mind and started going into rescue missions, taking turns with Rey and basically everyone who felt like they could._

_The place they were hiding in was almost like a cave, but it was safe. Hot during the day and cold during the night, because it was almost in the desert, but safe - except that there was still the mole thing._

_“Ezra is getting better every day,” Alex murmured one day and Rey smiled, without taking her eyes off the heating system she was building. They had objectively bigger problems than being cold, but food wasn’t something she could create with metallic pieces._

_Her stomach growled loudly and she lowered her head._

_“I know,” Alex mumbled, hands in his hair, “we need more food.”_

_She shrugged._

_“We do,” he insisted. They had decided to create turns, for the food they found and rationed. First the youngest, then the weak or sick. At that point the others, favoring the fighters because they needed strength._

_Only then Alex and Rey would eat… Which meant not eating a lot, no._

_“I’m dead tired,” he smiled. “We should go to sleep.”_

_She nodded, letting everything on the table. “Go. I check on the others for a second,” she wrote._

_“Alright.”_

_Alex kissed her forehead and got out of the cave she had chosen as the laboratory; he changed his mind at the last second and decided to take a quick bath._

_Rey, on the other side, actually followed her plan and checked that everyone was okay - she then would have checked if the people on watch were still awake._

_She stared at the “beds” - more like pillows and blankets - and noticed there was one empty._

_Fear crawled into her veins, so she ran to the different caves, looking for the only person missing, and she was so focused on her task that she tripped over something and fell._ What… _, Rey thought, turning to look at the thing at her feet._

_It wasn’t a thing, though. It was Michael, one of the people on watch._

_No, please!, she begged into her mind._

_There was only one explanation and she didn’t want to believe it, because it meant that Ultron was there, with his army, in the caves._

_She heard a muffled noise and far away screams._

_  
One bed had been empty._

_Rey closed her eyes for a second, forcing herself to breathe, and then she ran, looking for the only friend she had there, except for his brother._

Please tell me I’m wrong.

_She found her near the exit, eyes red of tears._

_“I’m sorry,” Blindfold cried. “I truly am.”_

No!

_Rey turned, heart pounding in her chest. She met Ultron’s eyes._

 

_Alex didn’t even manage to reach the cave where the river was. He was walking towards it, when he saw red eyes shine in the darkness._

_He moved backward so fast he fell to the ground. No!, he yelled into his mind. At least I’ll die standing!_

_He managed to stand up._

Pietro, I’m coming _, he thought, closing his eyes._

_When he opened them, his parents were looking at him, surrounded by the Avengers, and he was in the middle of a lab._

“Am I dead?”

 

_“Before you die,” Ultron said, in that ironic voice that made him so “human”, “I want you to see this.”_

_Another one of the Ultrons, one of the sentinels, flew in front of her, Ezra’s lifeless body in his arms.  
NO!, she yelled silently._

_“Now,” that monster walked towards her. “Last words?”_

_Rey shivered, lowering her head. “I don’t know how,” she murmured, voice broken because she hadn’t use it in so, so long, “but I promise you. We will win.”_

_Next thing she knew, she was in the middle of a lab, Alex hugging her in front of their parents._

_Finally, she thought._ Peace.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally I can post the chapter! I had it ready for a while, but I wanted to make you a surprise... You can find it at the end of the chapter

CHAPTER 13

 

“Alright, com’on,” Pietro patted him on the back. “I don’t think you have anything left in your stomach.”

Alex closed his eyes and rested his head against the cold wall by their side. “Why are you here?” he asked, even though he wasn’t sure he wanted to know. 

Pietro was buried in his past, in the pain, the fear and the guilt of that time, and it wasn’t fair that now he came back into his life that way; even worse, he had his face but not his memories, his smile but not the same love in his eyes.

“Professor X needs to talk to one of the Fantastic Four and I chose to jump on board,” he talked fast just like his Pietro did, and Alex felt his throat ache. “Then we saw the fight and we stopped to help.”

“Oh shit,” Alex exclaimed, remembering in that exact second the reason the X-Man had to save his life. “The fight!”

He sprinted, leaving Pietro behind for the not-even-a-second it took him to move too. “Wait, you’re gonna get sick again,” the mutant said, reaching out to stop him by the arm. 

“You don’t understand!” Alex almost yelled as an answer. “My sister, she-she was fighting and then she was… She couldn’t breathe!”

Pietro thought about it for a second, before letting him go - if _his_ sister had been in danger, not even an army would have stopped him. They ran side by side and the mutant forced himself to slow down; he kept looking at him, at Legend, thinking.

He was freaking hot, that was for sure, but there was something else, in him. Maybe it was the desperate expression he had when they first saw each other.   
Yeah, maybe it was that.

They stopped when they reached some of the Avengers, who had SHIELD by their side and who were talking to the reporters. The Sinister Six were nowhere to be seen, except for Electro, who was being handcuffed in that exact second. An agent took him away, but Alex didn’t really care about him - he just wanted to see his sister.

“Where is she?!” he asked as soon as he got near an Avenger - Falcon, to be more precise.

“Relax, kiddo. She’s fine, she’s going to the Tower right now. Why don’t you go too, we’ll deal with the press.”

“Thanks,” he nodded, eyes wide open and a lost expression on his face.

“Let’s go, hottie. The X-Men’s jet is over there,” Pietro smiled, taking him by the arm and starting to pulling him along.

“I’ll be faster alone.”

_We’ll be fast enough_ , a voice replied in his head; Alex immediately turned, body covered in the armor once more. 

A man in a wheelchair was waiting for him on the jet.

_Fuck, you’re professor X!_ , Alex realized, almost screaming in his head.

Charles sent him a pensive look. “I see,” he murmured, before turning to stare at Pietro.

The young Avenger paled. With his powers… He knew everything.

_I do_ , the professor said.

Alex turned to look out of the jet’s window and said nothing else.

 

“Thank you, son,” Steve smiled, first patting his back and then choosing to go for a hug.   
“I-I did nothing,” Peter replied. The X-Men jet had just parked on the terrace in front of them, but honestly it was Steve, who was making him the most uncomfortable. 

“Are you kidding us?” Tony exclaimed from his place on the couch, where he was holding Rey into his arms. She had already stopped shaking, his brave little girl, but her throat was still aching.

Sandman had almost killed her.

“You saved her life,” he continued.

Spider-man had swung into the scene and immediately jumped in the middle of the fight; he had already stopped Sandman more than once and he would have died, _died_ , before he’d let him kill Rey. She would have never faced Gwen’s fate.

Peter turned to look at the girl, so little in her father’s arms, and felt a wave of relief.

She was safe.

“Professor X!” Steve interrupted his thoughts. The Avengers greeted the X-Men who had helped with the Supervillains, while Rey stood up and ran to hug his brother.  
“You’re okay,” Peter heard him murmur. They were so sweet, in their weirdness - they did come from another universe, after all - and his heart always felt warm, when the two of them were together.

“H-how di-did- how did- how did you-” Alex asked, eating his words every time his eyes met Pietro’s.

“Peter,” Rey replied with a big smile. Talking was every day simpler than the one before and she was finally starting to feel like the girl she once was - not the same, of course, because she had lived too much, _felt_ too much, but even talking a little was a big, gigantic winning.

She turned to look at him and froze noticing Pietro; Alex’s hand on her arm, however, made her realize it wasn’t the time to make a scene.

“Come in, _mi casa es tu casa_ ,” Tony smiled. “And what do you need to discuss with Richards?”  
“Doctor Richards,” Steve corrected him without thinking.

“You don’t see _me_ going around as _doctor_ Stark and I’ll let you know that I actually have-”

“This is not the time,” Steve shut him up with a kiss - he had the power to do so, now, and he felt over the moon in doing it.

“Well,” Cyclops started saying, but the kids stopped listening, all for different reasons.

Peter, for example, had lost the ability to do basically anything, because Rey had hugged him and she was still holding onto him, face hidden in his chest. He knew she could hear his heart.

_Fuck, slow down_ , he prayed it.

It went even faster - go figures.

“Thank you,” she murmured, quietly as always, and he felt his heart melt.

“I’d do it a thousand times,” he replied, hugging her and kissing her on the forehead.

“Don’t,” she stepped back. “Alex does it.”

“And I can’t?” Peter worried. Maybe he had moved too fast, or he had misinterpreted something. Maybe she didn’t want him to feel that way.

Had he ruined everything?

She shook her head. “You’re not him.”

“I-I know.”

Why couldn’t he talk like he always did? He had a smart mouth!

“I-I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” he added, moving to get some space between them; she followed and they ended up being mostly covered by the door. The Avengers could still see them, but at least it made them feel more… Alone. With a little bit more privacy than being in the middle of the room.

Rey shook her head once more and Peter stared at her, confused.

“I didn’t? Make you uncomfortable, I mean.”

She did it again.

“So it’s something different.”

She nodded.

“I’m just… Not him?”

Rey first smiled and then laughed quietly, looking at him with eyes full of joy and fear at the same time. “I don’t see you like that,” she muttered.

Peter frowned. “Like…”

“A brother.”

“Well wha-oh. _Oh!_ ” he realized and immediately shot her a look. Her face was as red as a tomato. “Me too!”

She seemed surprised. “You-?”

He kissed her, wasting no time, and he heard everyone in the room cheer, yelling and laughing; not that he cared, nor did she - that moment was too perfect.

 

“It was the most painfully awkward declaration I have ever seen,” Tony commented in Steve’s ear, making him laugh.

“She takes it from you.”

“From _us_.”

 

On the other hand, the reason Alex didn’t see the scene, or listened to the X-Men, was that he wasn’t even in the room.

After making sure his sister was okay, in fact, he had run away as fast as he could, taking the elevator to the roof and hiding there.

He was having difficulties to breathe.

“Are you okay?” Pietro asked him running by his side and holding his arm. He noticed his confused look and shrugged. “I took the stairs.”

“Let me go!” Alex yelled as an answer, moving fast and litterally pushing the other away.

“Hey! I only helped you, today!”

“Well you shouldn’t!

Pietro looked at him like he was crazy. “Can I know what I did to you?!”

Alex froze, recognizing the _hurt_ under the cockiness, and his eyes filled with tears. “I don’t want to talk about it.”  
“You mean _with me_ ,” the mutant snapped.

“I don’t want you to know, alright?!”

Pietro stopped, hurt. “I didn’t even know you before today, except for the News.”

Alex sobbed loudly at that, but then refused to admit to himself how badly it hurt. Of course he doesn’t know me, he thought, desperate. _He’s not him_.

“But maybe I could,” Pietro continued; the Avenger immediately looked at him, shocked. “I… You’re cool. And hot. And you seem a genuinely good guy - and I need that, ‘cause you have no idea who my father is, but he’s- nevermind.”

“No,” Alex blurted, a wave of nausea making him gag.

Pietro stilled. “I had the feeling you liked men,” he murmured.

“And I do.”

“So it’s just me.”

Alex really couldn’t stand to hear him and see him this hurt, but how could he… “Do you know anything about me?”

“Not really.”

“We come from another universe, Rey and I. One where the world was falling apart and to die was considered to be lucky,” he admitted, moving to look at the city and not at the man standing by his side, who gasped loudly.

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah.”

“…Did I exist in that world?”

Alex looked at him and said nothing, but Pietro, beautifully amazing Pietro, understood anyway. “We were a thing.”

“We were,” Alex nodded.

“And now even looking at me hurts.”

“And now even looking at you hurts,” he confirmed. He felt the tears he had so desperately tried to hold fall and wet first his cheeks and then his shirt. 

Pietro touched the middle of his back, comforting.

“I never told him I loved him, you know?” Alex murmured then and the X-Man froze, before moving and making him move as well.

“Then tell me.”  
“You’re not him.”

“I know. But maybe it helps.”

They looked at each other and Pietro fought the instinct to turn around and run, because Alex’s eyes were full of something he never saw directed to him. It made him shiver - it made him want to be enough, for him. To be someone he’d be proud of.

And yet it made him uncomfortable, because that day had been the first time they met, at least for him.

“I can’t,” Alex muttered after a second.

“I look like him,” Pietro replied slowly, confused.

“But you don’t feel the same.”

He moved to leave the roof and go back to his room, where he could be safe and alone with his thoughts, but Pietro stopped him. “Look, I don’t. But I could.”

“What?”

“Give me time. You look like the kind of guy I could fall for,” he admitted.

Alex didn’t even need to think about it. “It’s not the same!”

“Well we could ask Professor X to show me your memories of me and- no, horrible idea.”

The other nodded quickly. It would’ve been an abomination.

“Let me-”

“No, Pietro. I loved him, okay? And he died. You… You just have his face. Nothing more. I loved him for the person he was and the person he was had been created by everything that happened.”

He moved to the door that led to the stairs, eyes dry once more, heart aching but mind sure it was the best idea, and suddenly the nausea wasn’t there anymore. 

He had chosen right.

“I’m not him,” Pietro repeated from behind his back. “And I’m glad of it.”

Alex fought the instinct to turn quickly and look at him like he was an alien, and stood there, waiting for him to go on, but refusing to meet his eyes.

“I’m glad because I want it all, hottie. I want to remember our first kiss, our first time, even the first time we appear in public together. I want you to consider Wanda like a sister and the same for me and Rey; I want us to fight the world and do it side by side. I want it all, Alex.”

Alex slowly opened the door.

“I’ll make you fall in love with me - not him. _Me_. And, honestly, I don’t care how long it will take.” 

Refusing to acknowledge the little smile across his face, Alex got inside and let the door close behind him. He was so confused he barely felt like a human being, but by the time the elevator brought him to the others he was fine again - even though Pietro had ran there before him.

It was the voices he could hear, the laughs and the shouts. It was Peter’s shy smile and Pietro’s eyes full of promises. It was his parents-not-parents looks full of love and understanding, while they held each other as they needed it to survive.

  
It was Rey and her expression, so fragile and happy at the same time, and her arms around him. It was his hands on her back and her broken voice in his ear. 

“We’re okay.”

It was the pain and the joy in his words, when he replied: “ _we’re home_.”

It was the love the entire room was filled with.

 

And that kind of love lasts forever.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are! Thank you all for walking by my side in the new adventure that was writing a fanfic in English. It's been amazing ahah  
> I hope you like it, leave a comment or kudos if so ;)  
> Aaaaand here the surprise/the reason I'm so late: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9kB2801ZwY&feature=youtu.be
> 
> I'm not so sure about Alex, but I couldn't find the right actor. I think he'd be a mix between Dylan O'Brien, Alex Lightwood of Shadowhunters and Junior of Under the Dome.  
> Anyway, enjoy! <3


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